OF 


JOSEPH  FORT  NEWT 


•*v 


THE  SWORD  OF 
THE  SPIRIT 

BRITAIN  AND  AMERICA 
IN  THE  GREAT  WAR 


BY 

JOSEPH  FORT  NEWTON,  Litt.D.,  D.D. 

Minister  of  The  City  Temple 


•;\-' 


^^^.^f  OF  Pfl/.V^ 


NEW  YORK 
GEORGE  H.  DORAN  COMPANY 


Copyright,  1918, 
By  George  H.  Doran  Company 


Printed  in  the  United  States  of  America 


TO 

THE  OFFICERS,  MEMBERS  AND  FRIENDS 

OF  THE  CITY  TEMPLE 

IN  GRATITUDE  FOR  LOVE  ABOUNDING 

AND  LOYALTY  UNWAVERING, 

•  I  INSCRIBE  THIS  VOLUME 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 

in  2009  with  funding  from 

Princeton  Theological  Seminary  Library 


http://www.archive.org/details/swordofspiritbOOnewt 


PRELUDE 

IF  the  City  Temple  has  been  an  international  shrine 
almost  from  the  beginning  of  its  history,  it  is 
doubly  so  to-day,  not  alone  from  the  fact  that  its 
present  Minister  is  an  American  citizen,  but  still 
more  because  of  the  reunion  of  English  speaking 
peoples  drawn  together  by  a  common  peril  and  a 
common  ideal.  The  call  of  an  American  preacher 
to  so  famous  a  pulpit  was  itself  an  overture  of  friend- 
ship of  good-will,  and  was  so  understood  by  men  of 
all  creeds  in  America;  and  in  obedience  to  that  spirit 
the  Minister  himself  has  been  led  to  conceive  of 
his  responsibility  in  a  two-fold  aspect — as  a  Christian 
Ambassador  and  an  Interpreter  of  one  nation  to 
another.  But  since  these  two  great  people  are  really 
one,  having  a  common  genius  and  a  common  historic 
inheritance,  these  two  offices  are  also  one,  since  we 
can  best  understand  each  other  in  the  Christian  at- 
mosphere, which  is  the  spirit  of  fraternity. 

First,  then,  and  chiefly,  the  present  ministry  would 
fain  be  an  ambassadorship  of  Christian  faith  and 
[fellowship,  an  apostolate  of  the  Gospel  of  the  Eternal 
Christ,  keeping  the  continuity  of  faith  while  seeking 
to  interpret  it  in  the  terms  of  to-day,  for  the  needs  of 
to-day,  alike  in  personal  realization  and  social  ap- 
plication: never  forgetting  that  a  personal  experience 
of  things  immortal  is  the  permanent  fountain  of 


viii  PRELUDE 

creative  Christian  service  and  fruitful  social  enter- 
prise. Second,  and  hardly  less  important,  it  would 
promote  fellowship,  sympathetic  understanding  and 
intelligent  appreciation  between  two  peoples  who 
have  drifted  apart  less  through  difference  of  ideals 
than  through  divergent  development,  in  the  convic- 
tion that  upon  their  co-operation  the  future  freedom 
and  peace  of  the  world,  if  not  the  very  existence  of 
civilization,  manifestly  depend;  and  in  the  further 
conviction  that  unless  Christian  principles  are  to  be 
the  ruling  principles  between  nations  hereafter,  we 
can  have  no  security  and  no  civilization  upon  which 
we  can  rely. 

There  are  those  who  say — as  Mr.  Galsworthy 
seems  to  say  in  his  play  "Foundations" — that  the 
world  after  the  war  will  be  the  same  world  that  it 
was  before,  only  worse,  reaction  frorn  sublime  self- 
sacrifice  leading  to  sordid  scramble  for  advantage. 
Surely  that  cannot  be  true.  The  war  will  end  in 
time ;  but  not  so  the  thoughts  it  has  awakened.  Nor 
will  the  lessons  learned  at  such  terrible  cost  be  for- 
gotten in  a  day,  albeit  all  the  insight  and  sagacity  we 
can  command  will  be  needed  to  direct  the  forces 
now  engaged  in  destruction  to  the  building  of  a  better 
world-order.  When  London  was  burned  in  the 
Great  Fire,  Christopher  Wren  brought  forward  a 
plan  for  a  new  city  with  wide  streets  all  converging 
toward  a  central  shrine  of  common  worship,  which 
is  to-day  at  once  his  monument  and  his  memorial. 
The  plan  was  accepted  by  the  city  authorities,  but 
it  could  not  be  worked  out  because  every  householder 


PRELUDE  ix 

insisted  that  his  house  should  stand  exactly  where 
it  stood  before  and  be  the  same  size.  Once  again 
a  great  fire  has  swept  over  the  City  of  Man,  and  it 
will  be  a  vast  blunder  to  attempt  to  rebuild  a  social 
order  which  had  in  it  the  possibility  of  the  present 
disaster.  Time  out  of  mind  we  have  been  trying  to 
build  a  Christian  civilization  on  an  unchristian 
foundation :  it  cannot  be  done.  As  Lord  Grey  puts 
it,  either  we  "must  learn  or  perish" ;  either  we  must 
find  a  way  to  abolish  war  or  live  under  the  threat 
and  menace  of  wars  still  more  frightful,  until  at  last 
there  will  be  "a  famished  race  of  men  looting  in 
search  of  non-existent  food  amidst  the  smouldering 
ruins  of  civilization."^ 

Even  now  epoch-making  ideas,  hitherto  held  to  be 
iridescent  dreams,  are  stinging  the  human  mind  like 
spray  flung  from  the  boundless  deep,  challenging  us 
to  adventure :  A  World  Made  Safe  for  Democracy, 
A  People's  Pact,  A  League  of  Nations,  A  United 
Christianity.  These,  with  the  ideals  of  Labour, 
which  are  at  once  passionate  and  prophetic,  are  ex- 
pressive of  a  will  for  a  more  redemptive  spiritual 
unity  of  mankind.  Is  Christianity  dying,  as  Mr. 
Arnold  Bennett  and  others  tell  us  it  is,  almost  as  if 
that  were  a  pleasing  fact?  Of  course  it  is  dying: 
that  is  its  genius,  which  they  do  not  understand:  to 
die  like  its  Master  and  rise  again,  radiant  and  re- 
born. Evermore  it  must  die  to  its  outworn  forms 
of  creed  and  rite,  and  rise  to  a  new  vision  of  the 
Truth:  must  die  to  its  narrow  sectarianism,   and 

»"In  the   Fourth  Year,"  by   H.   G.  Wells. 


X  PRELUDE 

rise  as  "the  Beloved  Community."  What  are  these 
new  watchwords,  so  urgent  with  prophecy,  but  the 
rediscovery  that  the  life  of  man  is  fundamentally 
spiritual  and  that  brotherliness  is  the  law  of  life, 
foretelling  a  day  when  nothing  will  be  taken  for 
Christianity  but  the  religion  of  love  of  God  and  Love 
of  Man;  that  the  knell  of  the  letter  of  Christianity 
has  been  struck,  and  that  we  must  now  inaugurate 
and  enthrone  its  spirit ! 

At  the  onset  of  the  world-war  an  English  essayist 
said,  in  surprise,  "The  immoralists  meant  what  they 
said,"  and  so  did  the  Christian  moralists — only,  alas, 
only  a  few  believed  either  testimony  save  in  a  vague, 
indolent  way.  Then  came  the  awakening!  Now 
thoughtful  men  of  every  persuasion  see  that  the 
realities  are  as  Jesus  said  they  were  long,  long  ago, 
and  that  His  principles  are  as  universal,  as  immut- 
able, as  inescapable,  in  the  end,  as  the  laws  of  physics. 
Even  a  wayfaring  man  must  see  that  if  we  had  acted 
out  in  our  lives  the  Christianity  we  profess  to  believe 
in  our  hearts,  this  inconceivable  tragedy  could  not 
have  happened.  By  the  same  token,  "we  are  realiz- 
ing as  we  never  realized  before  that  the  Christianiz- 
ing of  men,  of  all  men,  in  their  relations,  is  not  so 
much  a  matter  of  interest  to  the  Church  as  a  matter 
of  life  or  death  for  the  world."  ^  It  is  astonishing, 
as  a  novelist  has  said,  how  we  have  come  through 
blood  and  fire  and  tears  to  find  how  sound  a  meaning 
attached  to  the  familiar  phrases  of  the  Christian 
faith.    At  last,  after  ages  of  tragedy,  we  come  back 

1  "Jesus  and  Life,"  by  J.  F,  MacFadyn. 


PRELUDE  xi 

with  bleeding  feet  to  learn  that  in  the  Mind  of 
Jesus — so  deep,  so  pure,  so  sane,  so  lovely — the 
Voice  of  the  Universe  found  clear,  sweet,  authentic 
expression,  and  that  there  is  no  security  until  we 
obey  His  words. 

What  practical  program  lies  to  our  hand,  offering 
an  opportunity  for  service  and  a  promise  of  fruitful 
results?  For  one  thing,  our  Christianity  must  realise 
and  affirm  its  essential  character  as  an  International 
fellowship,  as  over  against  the  false,  sectional,  class 
Internationals  which  have  usurped  its  right.  By 
this  is  meant  not  an  organic  union  of  Churches  all 
at  once,  but  their  co-operation  in  behalf  of  a  better 
mood,  a  finer  insight,  and  the  habit  of  thinking  in 
terms  of  one  Humanity  and  one  Christianity.  No 
doubt  some  form  of  catholic  Christian  union  will 
come  in  time — It  already  exists,  and  needs  only  to  be 
discovered — and  it  may  come  more  quickly  than  we 
anticipate.  But  It  cannot  be  hastened.  If  It  Is  arti- 
ficial, it  will  be  superficial.  It  must  come  spiritually 
and  spontaneously,  in  answer  to  a  great  yearning  of 
the  Christian  heart  for  a  wider  fellowship  and  a 
deeper  experience  of  the  Truth.  Else  It  will  be  a 
union  not  of  the  Church,  but  of  the  Churchyard. 
Nor  will  it  come  by  erasing  all  historical  loyalties  in 
one  indistinguishable  blur.  Its  secret  lies  deeper — 
in  the  spirit  of  things.  But  meantime,  and  while  that 
union  Is  on  the  way  to  fulfilment,  the  finest,  clearest, 
wisest  Christian  vision  must  be  brought  to  bear  upon 
the  social  and  world-war  that  has  to  be  built  on  the 
ruins  of  war. 


xii  PRELUDE 

What  matters  is  a  new  spirit;  in  each  nation  men 
must  make  themselves  felt  and  heard,  who  will  say 
openly  that  there  is  no  way  out  of  this  hell  of  mad- 
ness unless  we  resolve  to  give  up  the  old  evil  spirit 
that  rules  the  intercourse  of  nations,  and  from  the 
bottom  of  our  hearts  learn  to  love  and  think  out  a 
new  world.  From  thousands  of  sanctuaries  in  many 
lands,  week  by  week,  year  by  year,  witness  has  been 
borne  on  behalf  of  the  Christian  principles  and  ideals. 
Individually  we  have  not  been  unfaithful  to  the  vis- 
ion, but  the  lack  of  a  united  voice,  bearing  fruit  in  a 
united  eloquence,  has  been  our  weakness.  What  we 
need  is  to  weave  these  many  tones  into  a  mighty 
World-voice,  that  shall  utter  the  Christian  insight 
and  witness  for  the  leadership  of  mankind  in  its  task 
of  reconstruction.  And  that  voice  should  make  it- 
self heard,  with  all  emphasis  and  appeal,  equally 
against  Militarism,  Mammonism,  and  Anarchy,  in 
behalf  of  Rightness  as  the  truest  Common-sense,  in- 
sisting that  the  business  of  the  world  must  be  done 
in  the  open,  and  that  straightforward  dealing  as  be- 
tween nation  and  nation  in  the  spirit  of  brotherliness 
is  the  only  way  to  realise  equity  and  peace. 

For  example,  If  there  is  to  be  such  a  thing  as  a 
League  of  Nations  and  If  it  is  to  be  anything  more 
than  a  paper  league,  it  must  begin  with  a  league  be- 
tween English-speaking  nations.  If  we,  who  have 
one  language,  one  religion,  one  historic  tradition, 
and  one  Ideal  of  civilization,  cannot  be  brought  to- 
gether Into  such  a  league  of  friendship,  then  it  is  idle 
to  talk  about  a  League  of  Nations  following  the  war. 


PRELUDE  xiii 

It  would  be  only  an  affair  of  diplomatic  dicker,  pow- 
erless against  the  promptings  of  self-interest  and  the 
competitions  of  commerce.  In  order,  then,  to  help 
bring  about  a  real  League  of  English-spealcing  Na- 
tions, and  as  a  basis  and  nucleus  for  such  a  league, 
we  need  a  League  of  Churches,  or  at  least  their  co- 
operation In  a  ministry  of  Interpretation  and  fellow- 
ship. Isolation  is  at  an  end.  The  self-sufHcient  na- 
tion is  a  thing  of  the  past.  The  old  Declarations  of 
Independence  but  give  place  to  Declarations  of  Inter- 
dependence, In  the  spirit  of  mutual  regard  and  In 
the  knowledge  that  the  common  welfare  of  the  race 
Is  the  concern  of  all  alike.  Surely  here  is  an  oppor- 
tunity unparalleled  for  the  Christian  Gospel,  If  the 
Church  is  clear-sighted  enough  to  see  it  and  sagacious 
enough  to  improve  It,  linking  two  peoples  for  the 
service  of  all.^* 

For,  consider  the  problems  that  face  us.  One 
thing  is  clear :  the  future  of  the  world  Is  democratic, 
and  nothing  can  stop  It.  Tokens  could  not  be  plainer, 
and  farseeing  religious  leaders,  who  divine  the  curve 
of  destiny,  will  seek  to  leaven  the  future  now  in  the 

*  More  specifically  and  in  detail,  it  may  be  suggested:  (i) 
As  we  in  America  must  study  English  history  to  learn  the  roots 
of  our  own  history  and  the  origin  of  our  institutions,  so  English 
schools  ought  to  study  American  history  to  learn  some  of  the 
fruits  of  their  own  history  and  genius.  (2)  Suppose  it  should 
be  arranged  that  in  every  pulpit  in  both  lands  one  or  more 
sermons  should  be  preached  each  year  expressing  the  growing 
desire  for  a  closer  co-operation,  if  not  alliance,  between  the  two 
peoples  .  .  .  would  that  not  do  much  toward  making  it  a  reality? 
(3)  In  his  remarkable  book,  "The  Invisible  Alliance,"  Francis 
Grierson  said,  long  before  the  war,  "The  forthcoming  American 
understanding  will  include  the  religious  element,  working  with 
the  social  and  political — English  and  American  preachers  will 
exchange  pulpits." 


xiv  PRELUDE 

making  with  the  spirit  of  the  Gospel.  The  spokes- 
man of  the  New  World  has  said  that  we  are  fighting 
this  war  to  make  the  world  safe  for  democracy;  but 
there  remains  the  more  difficult  task  of  making 
democracy  safe  for  the  world.  Democracy  as  such 
is  no  panacea.  Left  to  itself,  without  discipline, 
without  spiritual  vision,  it  may  become  a  plague. 
If  democracy  is  inevitable,  we  must  evangelize  the 
inevitable — as  Wesley,  by  his  magnificent  and  cease- 
less evangel,  saved  the  England  of  his  day  from  the 
red  revolution,  by  capturing  for  Christ  the  men  who 
else  had  fomented  strife;  and  if  this  is  not  done  the 
inevitable  will  come  off  without  it,  with  what  result 
none  can  foresee.  But  our  evangelism,  to  be  effec- 
tive to-day,  must  not  simply  appeal  to  the  individual, 
but.must  have  as  well  a  social  emphasis  and  passion; 
and  by  the  same  sign,  its  methods  must  be  such  as 
are  usable  to-day,  and  its  message  uttered  in  terms 
that  can  be  understood  by  the  men  of  to-day.  Issues 
of  such  pith  and  moment  dwarf  into  nothingness  the 
things  that  divided  the  sects  In  other  days,  and  they 
call  us  to  launch  out  into  enterprises  the  like  of  which 
we  have  not  dreamed  before,  much  less  attempted. 
Manifestly  we  stand  at  the  end  of  an  era  "con- 
demned to  something  great."  The  high,  Ineffable  will 
by  which  the  world  is  ruled  works  by  evolution,  but 
also  by  revolution.  As  the  grand  divisions  of  geo- 
logical history  had  their  beginnings  in  stupendous 
upheavals,  so  the  great  epochs  In  our  human  world 
have  their  origin  in  overturnlngs.  Such  an  epoch 
is  even  now  upon  us,  dividing  the  story  of  Man  into 


PRELUDE  XV 

before  and  after.  Over  the  doors  of  our  age  an 
unseen  Hand  is  writing,  in  letters  of  fire,  that  word 
which  is  the  law  of  God  and  the  hope  of  man. 
"Behold,  I  make  all  things  new."  Progress  is  by 
Divine  authority,  by  Divine  necessity;  God  is  the 
great  innovator. 

I  looked;   aside  the  mist-cloud  rolled, 
The  Waster  seemed  the  Builder,  too; 

Upspringing  from  the  ruined  Old, 
I  saw  the  New. 

Evolution  is  not  automatic.  History  dates  from 
the  Eternal  intention;  it  is  the  story  of  the  deeds  of 
God  done  in  time.  Here  is  the  supreme  sanction 
of  human  enterprise  and  expectation,  the  ultimate 
pledge  of  progress,  and  the  inspiration  of  creative 
endeavour.  Force,  Fear,  Faith,  these  three;  but 
the  greatest  of  these  is  the  Faith  that  lays  hold  of 
the  mighty  will  of  God  and  reshapes  the  world  after 
the  pattern  of  the  Ideal  seen  on  the  Mount.  Ever- 
more, as  a  wise  teacher  has  said,  the  race  must  be- 
come partner  in  the  moral  enterprise,  fellow-worker 
with  the  Eternal  at  His  ethical  task,  if  its  heart  of 
rhythm  and  soul  of  fire  are  to  stand  fully  revealed. 

Whatever  betide,  God  lives,  the  human  soul  is  un- 
conquerable, goodness  and  beauty  are  in  the  world, 
and  the  living  Presence  which  men  call  Christ.  They 
are  here  in  our  human  hearts.  We  feel  them  as 
power;  we  know  them  as  love.  Their  touch  upon 
us  makes  us  idealists,  altruists,  optimists,  and  we 
dream.    What  though  our  dream  be  delayed  in  ful- 


xvi  PRELUDE 

filment,  It  does  but  emphasise  our  obligation  to  put 
forth  a  more  heroic  effort  in  behalf  of  a  finer  issue 
of  character  and  a  nobler  social  order.  The  fact  is 
undeniable.  Mankind  began  low,  and  has  been 
climbing  higher  through  untold  ages  of  pain,  pushed 
upward  by  compulsions  he  could  not  escape,  pulled 
upward  by  influences  he  could  not  resist.  The  ascent 
is  inevitable,  and  not  even  the  tragedy  of  world-war 
can  stay  it,  much  less  stop  it,  because  God  is  behind 
it,  within  it,  above,  and  beyond  It. 

Surely  the  profound  and  underguiding  thought  of 
our  time  Is  the  sense  of  the  Divine  Indwelling,  of  the 
everywhereness  of  God,  and  of  the  growth  of  the 
Spiritual  Life  as  the  key  to  the  history  of  the  world 
and  of  the  meaning  of  life.  No  other  explanation 
really  explains  the  uprising  passion  and  desire  of 
humanity,  and  its  outreaching  after  the  Ideal;  it  is 
the  Life  of  God  seeking  new  incarnation  in  the 
struggle  of  the  race  toward  the  Light.  Such  is  "the 
Increasing  purpose"  running  through  the  ages,  re- 
vealing Itself  In  the  aspirations  and  Institutions  of 
man.  While  one  may  not  In  a  few  moments  trace  in 
detail  the  ramifications  and  outworkings  of  this  in- 
sight, we  can  at  least  follow  some  of  its  tendencies. 
Much  is  yet  uncertain,  but  It  seems  certain  that  the 
future  will  be  shaped  by  three  forces :  The  Spirit  of 
Science,  the  Democratic  Principle,  and  the  Christian 
Evangel :  and  these  three  must  learn  to  work  together 
as  partners  an^  friends. 

Who  Is  the  Angel  of  the  New  Day,  its  dawn  now 
red  with  sacrifice,  but  dimly  radiant  with  the  promise 


PRELUDE  xvii 

of  a  better  time  to  be?  Who  is  it  that  holds  out  the 
only  hope  of  a  world  made  wiser  by  its  folly  and 
nobler  by  its  suffering?  Who  is  it  that  has  haunted 
our  hearts  during  these  bitter  days,  His  keen  sword 
felt  in  our  sharp  questionings,  His  ineffable  touch 
softening  our  sorrow.  His  presence  made  manifest 
in  the  new  crucifixion  of  humanity?  It  is  the  Eternal 
Christ — the  outcast  Christ,  so  long  despised  and  re- 
jected of  men,  His  face  marred  more  than  the  face 
of  any  man  amidst  the  horror  of  the  strife — not  the 
Christ  of  our  subtle  creeds,  but  the  Comrade  of  men 
and  women;  no  wraith  of  a  far-off  faith  and  a  time 
long  gone,  but  a  Companion  who  "sorrows  with  in- 
domitable eyes,"  yet  still  hoping  all  things,  believing 
all  things,  even  while  enduring  all  things.  He  it  is 
whom  humanity  will  yet  crown  without  a  thorn — His 
spirit  our  salvation.  His  love  the  hope  of  the  soul, 
and  His  laws  the  only  basis  of  a  world-order  wherein 
dwelleth  righteousness  and  peace. 

Joseph  Fort  Newton. 
City  Temple,  London. 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Prelude vii 

The  Continuity  of  Faith 23 

England  and  America 34 

The  Religion  of  Lincoln 45 

Holding  the  World  Together 56 

The  Interpreter 67 

Our  Father 78 

Divine  Guidance  in  Human  Affairs    ....  88 

Providence 98 

The  Ministry  of  Sorrow 108 

The  God  of  Comfort 117 

The  Mystery  of  Pain 127 

The  Compassion  of  Christ 136 

The  Sword  of  the  Saints 145 

The  Intercessor 155 

The  Shadow  Christ 163 

The  Eternal  Communion 172 

The  Unbound  Christ 182 

Two  OR  Three  and  Jesus 191 

The  Mother  of  Jesus 200 

The  Little  Sanctuaries 211 

The  Victory  of  the  Cross 221 

The  Eternal  Values •.  230 

xiz 


THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 


THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 


THE  CONTINUITY  OF  FAITH 

"Jesus    Christ    the    same    yesterday,    and    to-day,    and    for 
ever." — Heb.  xiii.   8. 

FORTY-FIVE  years  ago— May  19,  1873— the 
cornerstone  of  the  City  Temple  was  laid; 
exactly  one  year  later  the  Temple  was  opened;  a  year 
ago  the  present  ministry  began.  Thus,  by  an  inter- 
esting coincidence,  we  have  a  triple  anniversary,  and 
it  seems  well  to  observe  it,  because  the  past  is  a 
storehouse  of  inspiration  for  the  present.  Nowhere 
is  the  Bible  nearer  to  the  need  of  the  human  heart 
than  in  its  frequent  and  wise  appeal  to  the  ways  of 
God  in  other  days;  so  that,  in  their  perplexity,  men 
may  have  the  wisdom  and  prophecy  of  history.  Our 
fathers  were  once  as  we  are,  active,  aspiring,  baffled, 
and  deeply  troubled;  but  they  endured  and  overcame 
by  the  grace  of  God,  as  we  may  do  by  a  like  faith  and 
fidelity — such  is  the  message  of  the  Voice  from  Be- 
hind. 

Surely  it  is  an  arresting  coincidence  that  this  day 
of  beginnings  in  our  history  should  fall  on  the  great 
Day  of  Beginnings  In  the  history  of  the  Church — the 
Festival  of  the  Gift  of  the  Spirit.    The  day  of  Pen- 

23 


24  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

tecost,  if  we  may  not  say  that  it  was  the  birthday  of 
the  Church,  was  at  least  its  awakening,  its  trans- 
figurationy  its  enduement,  not  with  a  doctrine,  but 
with  a  dynamic.  And  nothing  do  we  need  to-day  so 
urgently,  so  supremely.  Power  we  have  of  many 
kinds,  power  of  numbers,  of  wealth,  of  culture,  but 
the  pressing,  aching  need  of  the  Church  is  for  power 
of  another  kind,  and  a  higher — the  Power  of  the 
Holy  Spirit.  What  we  need  is  a  profounder  sense 
of  the  forces  available  by  faith  and  prayer  and  unity, 
a  new  visitation  of  the  Cleanser,  the  Teacher,  the 
Comforter  who  takes  the  things  of  Christ  and  shows 
them  to  us  anew.  Nothing  can  save  the  Church  and 
make  it  equal  alike  to  the  contradictions  of  war  and 
the  problems  of  peace  but  the  Spirit  which  created  it, 
and  which  has  led  it  through  the  ages. 

The  Church  was  not  born  yesterday;  it  will  not  die 
to-morrow.  Once,  so  runs  a  parable,  a  man  came  to 
a  great  city  full  of  palaces  of  freestone  and  marble, 
vying  with  one  another  in  their  splendour.  But  in 
the  heart  of  the  city  there  stood  an  old  House,  ill 
put  together,  full  of  cracks,  and  apparently  of  no 
use.  He  wondered  at  it.  It  had  no  stays,  no  props, 
and  he  wondered  how  it  kept  standing.  When,  after 
a  hundred  years,  he  came  to  that  city  again  the  pal- 
aces had  vanished,  and  other  edifices  of  equal  splen- 
dour and  after  a  new  style  had  risen  in  their  places. 
But  lo !  the  old  House  was  still  there,  unchanged,  as 
if  the  tooth  of  time  which  breaks  everything  else  had 
broken  itself  on  that.  Again,  after  a  hundred  years 
it  was  so.    The  old  House  was  still  the  same,  while 


THE  CONTINUITY  OF  FAITH  25 

all  around  was  new.  Out  of  the  palaces  came  many 
sick  people,  and  the  streets  were  full  of  the  weary  and 
heavy-laden  wandering  about,  whom  no  physician 
helped.  But  whosoever  went  into  the  old  House  that 
seemed,  like  them,  itself  to  need  a  physician,  came 
out  sound  and  glad.  Then  he  entered  the  House, 
and  there  he  beheld  One  who  laid  his  hand  upon  the 
sick  and  weary,  and  they  were  made  well.  Such  is 
the  Church  of  Christ,  the  House  of  the  Eternal  in 
the  bright  city  of  man — and  it  will  not  fail. 

What  is  the  Holy  Spirit,  by  which  the  Church  has 
been  kept  alive  for  nearly  twenty  centuries,  but  the 
living  presence  of  Christ,  who  is  the  same  yesterday, 
to-day,  and  for  ever?  The  Church  is  not  an  institu- 
tion— it  is  a  communion.  It  is  an  eternal  fellowship, 
on  earth  and  in  heaven,  of  all  those  of  every  age  and 
every  land,  who  love  Christ  and  seek  to  live  in  His 
Spirit.  It  is  the  union  in  Christ  of  all  who  have  found 
Him  to  be  the  Way,  the  Truth,  and  the  Life — "the 
portrait  of  the  unseen  God" — and  their  voices  answer 
one  another  across  the  ages,  antiphonally,  singing  His 
praise  alone.  Of  that  vast  chorus  the  City  Temple 
is  but  a  tiny  choir,  but  in  all  its  history,  from  the 
earliest  time  to  this  day,  it  has  struck  that  mighty 
music.  Its  ministers  have  had  each  his  own  insight, 
accent,  and  emphasis,  but  not  one  of  them  has  failed 
to  strike  that  redeeming  melody — not  one.  For 
proof  of  this  tradition  of  faith  let  us  go  back  to 
1873,  back  to  the  foundation  in  the  days  of  Thomas 
Goodwin,  in  1640.  On  his  death-bed  that  noble 
preacher — the  favourite  preacher  of  Cromwell,  and 


26  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

perhaps  the  greatest  pulpit  expositor  of  St.  Paul — 
left  this  testimony,  as  his  friends  prayed  that  all  the 
comfort  he  had  given  to  others  might  return  to  his 
own  heart  in  his  mortal  hour: — 

"  'All  these  died  in  faith.'  I  could  not  have  imagined 
that  I  should  ever  have  had  such  a  measure  of  faith  in  this 
hour;  no,  I  could  never  have  imagined  it.  My  bow  abides 
in  strength.  Is  Christ  divided?  No,  I  have  the  whole  of 
His  righteousness;  I  am  found  in  Him,  not  in  my  own 
righteousness.  .  .  .  Christ  cannot  love  me  better  than  He 
doth;  I  think  I  cannot  love  Christ  better  than  I  do;  I  am 
swallowed  up  in  God.     I  shall  be  ever  with  the  Lord!"  ^ 

There,  in  that  far  yesterday,  the  founder  of  this 
church,  dying,  put  his  trust  in  the  Christ  who  is  with 
us  to-day;  and  this  unity  and  continuity  of  faith  we 
need  to  realise  for  our  inspiration  and  solace.  It  is 
a  great  tradition,  and  more  than  a  tradition;  it  is  an 
abiding  reality,  a  living  force,  a  growing  revelation, 
a  tie  that  unites  the  centuries,  joining  a  mighty  host  in 
a  Divine  fellowship — like  the  cord  by  which  pilgrims 
in  the  Alps  are  tied  together,  so  that  If  one  slip  and 
fall  all  may  hold  him  up.  "Our  fathers  were  under 
a  cloud,"  fighting  for  civil  and  religious  liberty,  as  we 
are  under  a  pall  struggling  for  the  liberty  of  the 
world;  and  what  supported  them  will  sustain  us. 
What  a  reinforcement  such  a  historic  fellowship  is, 
what  an  Inspiration  to  those  who  walk  alone  in  far 
places — linking  the  loneliest  soul  with  a  vast  com- 
munion of  the  lovers  of  Jesus  I     Times  change,  and 

^Memoir  of   Good<win,  by  his  son.     Works,  vol.   ii. 


THE  CONTINUITY  OF  FAITH  27 

earthly  things  pass  away,  but  It  fortifies  the  soul  to 
know  that  the  Christ  In  whom  Goodwin  found  com- 
fort and  joy  In  1678  remains  to  redeem  and  bless  us 
in  this  far-off  age. 

There  is  such  a  thing  as  "an  Instinct  for  Christ," 
about  which  Goodwin  wrote  so  eloquently  in  his  day, 
by  which  the  Church  has  been  led  both  in  its  life 
and  in  its  thought.^  Carlyle  was  not  far  wrong  when 
he  said  that  If  Arlus  had  won,  Christianity  would 
have  dwindled  to  a  legend.  No  doubt;  but  what 
Goodwin  had  in  mind  was  not  so  much  the  instinct 
which  has  protected  the  Christian  faith  from  fatal 
fallacy,  but  that  turning  of  the  soul  to  Christ  in  Its 
bitter  need  of  cleansing  or  of  comfort,  "as  a  deer, 
when  It  is  struck  by  a  dart,  runs  to  the  herb  called 
dictamnus."  For,  to  say  no  more,  the  revelation  of 
God  in  Christ  is'  the  greatest  fact  In  human  history, 
at  once  the  hope  of  our  healing  and  the  master  light 
of  all  our  seeing;  so- great  a  fact  that  the  discovery 
of  a  new  hemisphere,  or  of  a  new  constellation  out 
on  the  edge  of  the  sky,  pales  beside  It.  Ages,  em- 
pires, and  civllisatipns  may  pass  away,  but  the  vision 
of  God  In  the  mind  of  Jesus  remains  the  pledge  of  our 
faith,  the  prophecy  of  our  hope,  and  the  ultimate 
rebuke  of  all  the  doubt  and  despair  to  which  we  may 
be  tempted. 

Forms  of  faith  are  not  essential ;  the  substance  is, 
"And  now  abldeth  faith,"  wrote  the  Apostle  in  his 
hymn  of  the  Eternity  of  love ;  but  the  same  hand  also 
described  how  the  Spirit  of  God  leads  us  "from  faith 

*  Works  of  Goodiuin,  vol.  viii.,  part  III.,  book  4. 


28  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

to  faith."  Both  texts  are  true;  a  living  faith  abides 
and  grows — abides,  indeed,  because  it  grows,  unfolds, 
expands,  taking  all  the  myriad  forms  that  life  and 
power  take.  Yet  it  is  ever  the  same  in  its  essence, 
in  its  central  insight  and  attachment.  Never  was 
this  truth  set  forth  more  picturesquely  than  by  Jo- 
seph Parker  in  his  striking  sermon  on  "Faith,  Self- 
enlarging,"  in  which  he  shows  that  faith  must  of 
necessity  grow,  by  its  own  inner  logic,  and  that  it  is 
only  real  when  it  does  grow.  His  text  was  the  words 
of  the  Master :  "Had  ye  believed  in  Moses  ye  would 
have  believed  in  Me";  inevitably  so,  by  force  of 
spiritual  logic.  That  is,  if  a  man  really  believes,  if 
he  has  a  living  faith,  he  will  recognise  that  faith  in 
new  forms.  Hear  these  vivid  sentences  from  the 
sermon : — 

"Every  man  supplies  the  true  test  of  his  own  faith.  Faith 
always  modernises  itself,  brings  itself  up  to  date,  catches  the 
last  vision,  and  the  last  phase  of  the  Divine  movement.  Faith 
is  not  final;  faith  is  a  beginning,  a  dawn,  a  spring  with  in- 
finite summers  in  its  soul.  A  man  does  not  believe  his  own 
creed  until  he  is  prepared  to  add  to  it.  Be  progressive, 
therefore,  and  do  not  imagine  that  the  statement  of  the 
creed  is  final.  The  spirit  of  faith  longs  for  more  worlds 
to  conquer.  Lord,  increase  our  faith ;  give  us  vision  after 
vision  of  Thy  loveliness  and  majesty."  ^ 

In  the  Letters  of  James  Smetham — and  a  fruitful 
and  wise  book  it  is — there  is  a  noble  page  telling 
how  each  man,  each  type  of  mind,  finds  in*  Christ 

*  The  City  Temple  Pulpit,  vol.  i. 


THE  CONTINUITY  OF  FAITH  29 

what  It  most  needs,  the  woman  over  the  wash-tub 
equally  with  the  philosopher  In  his  closet.  He  "never 
expects  you  to  be  other  than  yourself,  and  He  puts  In 
abeyance  toward  you  all  but  what  is  like  you."  What 
Is  true  of  the  individual  Is  no  less  true  of  a  genera- 
tion. Ages  differ;  one  is  rational,  another  mystical, 
and  still  another  scientific,  by  its  ruling  impulse  and 
mood.  No  matter;  the  same  Christ  ministers  to  each 
age  In  Its  need,  revealing  Himself  In  and  through  Its 
Intensest  yearning,  its  reigning  desire.  "He  ap- 
peared unto  them  in  another  form"  is  a  text  of  which 
the  whole  of  Christian  history  Is  an  exegesis.  Thus, 
the  faith  of  an  age  is  the  fruit  of  the  freest  possible 
use  of  all  those  powers  by  which  men  obtain  truth. 
Its  central  point  of  deepest  belief  going  out  with 
equal  radius-length  In  all  directions.  It  makes  no 
difference  that  the  vision  of  Christ  comes  In  a  variety 
of  ways  and  takes  many  forms,  if  only  It  grows  and 
abides. 

The  editor  of  the  Works  of  Goodwin  warns  us  not 
to  expect  to  find  any  "broad  theology"  in  his  pages, 
and  the  warning  was  well  meant.  What  Goodwin 
lacked  in  breadth  he  gained  In  depth,  a  dimension  we 
may  lose  In  our  eagerness  to  be  broad,  which  may 
be  only  another  name  for  shallowness.  The  perfect 
faith,  like  the  City  of  God,  Is  four-square,  and  "the 
length,  and  breadth  and  height  were  equal."  The 
true  measure  of  faith  is  found  In  the  words  of  the 
Psalmist:  "Thou  hast  set  my  feet  In  a  large  room," 
and  "deep  calleth  unto  deep."  Our  faith  must  go 
deep  Into  the  heart  and  high  Into  the  sky,  and  be  as 


30  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

lofty  as  It  is  broad;  as  high  as  the  hopes  of  God  for 
man,  and  broad  enough  to  embrace  the  broadest, 
deepest,  highest  Soul  of  all  the  ages.  So,  then,  if 
neither  the  dogmas  nor  the  forms  of  worship  of  our 
ancestors  satisfy  us  to-day,  it  does  not  mean  that  we 
have  lost  faith.  No;  men  are  free  and  broad,  not 
because  they  believe  less  than  others,  but  because  they 
believe  more — not  more  things,  so  much  as  more 
deeply,  more  hopefully,  more  nobly,  with  a  sunnier 
and  stronger  confidence  in  the  ways  of  God. 

"Where  is  thy  God,  my  soul? 
Is  He  within  thy  heart; 
Or  Ruler  of  a  distant  realm 
In  which  thou  hast  no  part? 

"Where  is  thy  God,  my  soul? 
Confined  to  Scripture's  page; 
Or  does  His  Spirit  check  and  guide 
The  spirit  of  each  age?" 

While  the  City  Temple  is  a  part  of  the  universal 
Christian  fellowship,  it  has  none  the  less  an  atmos- 
phere, if  not  an  emphasis,  of  its  own.  It  was  so  at 
the  beginning;  it  is  so  now.  Always  it  has  been  the 
home,  not  only  of  freedom  in  the  things  of  faith,  but 
also  of  a  comprehensive  and  catholic  spirit.  Our 
fathers  were  firm  in  their  faith,  ready  to  fight  for  it, 
suffer  for  it,  and,  if  need  were,  to  die  for  it;  but  they 
never  imagined  that  their  form  of  faith  was  final. 
Much  less  did  they  seek  to  impose  it  upon  others, 
save  by  suasion  and  the  arts  of  appeal  of  which  they 
were  masters.    The  great  men  of  1 65  8 — Owen,  Nye, 


THE  CONTINUITY  OF  FAITH  31 

Goodwin,  Caryl,  and  the  rest — knew  that  creeds  may 
become  a  fetter  and  an  injury.  Their  Declaration, 
as  they  were  careful  to  make  plain,  while  setting  forth 
their  own  convictions,  was  "not  to  be  made  use  of  as 
an  imposition  upon  any."  Force,  they  held,  destroys 
a  confession  of  faith  by  turning  it  into  "an  exaction 
or  imposition  of  faith,"  and  that,  as  they  knew,  de- 
stroys real  fellowship.  With  which  agreed  the  in- 
sight of  the  saintly  and  scholarly  Richard  Baxter, 
who,  from  his  home  in  "The  Saint's  Everlasting 
Rest,"  must  rejoice  at  the  movements  now  going  on 
among  us,  slowly  fulfilling  his  prophetic  vision  of  "the 
True  Catholick  Church."  ^ 

Not  only  does  the  City  Temple  stand,  as  it  has  al- 
ways stood,  for  freedom  of  faith — not  freedom  from 
faith,  for  that  way  lies  the  saddest  form  of  slavery — 
but  it  is  the  home  of  a  forward-looking  faith.  Rob- 
inson exhorted  his  heroic  flock,  at  parting  from  them, 
not  to  come  to  a  period  in  religion,  but  to  expect  new 
light  to  break  forth  from  the  word  of  God.  New 
light  has,  indeed,  broken  forth,  not  only  from  the 
written  word,  but  also  from  the  unwritten  word  of 
God;  light  so  revealing  as  to  the  universe  and  the 
life  of  man  that  the  men  who  lived  before  1850, 
to  say  nothing  of  Goodwin  and  the  men  of  his  time, 
seem  almost  as  remote  from  us  as  the  ancients.  In 
1859  Darwin  put  forth  his  thesis,  destined  to  alter 
our  outlook  and  ways  of  thinking;  ten  years  later 
Huxley  coined  the  word  Agnosticism,  as  describing 

*  Baxter's  Collected  Works,  Orme's  Edition,  especially  sermons 
on  "The  True  Catholick"  and  on  "Catholic  Unity." 


32  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

the  attitude  of  the  educated  mind.  Few  realise  what 
battles  of  faith  have  been  fought  and  how  profound 
has  been  the  change  of  attitude  and  emphasis,  since 
the  corner-stone  of  the  City  Temple  was  laid.  Nor 
do  you  need  to  be  reminded  how  picturesquely,  how 
effectively,  Joseph  Parker  dealt  with  these  issues,  one 
after  another,  in  this  pulpit,  now  in  wooing  tones  of 
appeal,  now  in  thunderous  rebuke. 

Yet,  in  it  all,  through  it  all,  there  was  a  living  faith 
in  the  Christ  who  is  the  same  yesterday,  to-day  and 
forever.  Happily  both  religion  and  science  are  less 
dogmatic,  not  because  they  have  less  faith,  but  just 
because  they  have  more,  science  having  become  more 
refined  and  religion  more  reasonable.  The  lawless 
universe  of  a  whimsical  God  is  gone  for  ever,  and 
with  it  many  an  unworthy  notion  which  made  the 
Father  of  humanity  less  divine  than  His  sons.  To- 
day a  universe  in  which  the  Holy  Spirit  is  immanent, 
pervaded  with  the  Divine  order,  and  reaching  out 
loveward,  is  the  possession  of  every  thinker.  Nor 
has  all  the  wit  of  man  found  anything  so  adequate  to 
the  deep  needs  of  the  human  soul,  alike  in  its  sin, 
its  sorrow,  and  its  seeking  after  satisfying  truth,  as 
the  Christ  whose  name  lingered  on  the  lips  of  Good- 
win as  he  went  to  sleep  long  ago.  If  that  be  true,  if 
Christ  alone,  apprehended  anew  in  every  age,  does 
meet  the  needs  of  the  heart  and  mind,  no  one  need 
fear  for  the  future.  Of  course,  no  one  can  predict 
what  forms  faith  may  take  in  the  far  future,  but  we 
may  be  sure  as  to  what  its  essence,  its  substance, 
will  be. 


THE  CONTINUITY  OF  FAITH  33 

Such  confidence  we  may  justly  derive  from  the  con- 
tinuity of  faith  through  the  centuries,  and,  truly,  we 
need  that  confidence  to-day,  standing,  as  we  are,  with 
trembling  expectation  on  the  threshold  of  a  future 
none  can  foresee.  Only  one  thing  is  clear — many 
things  will  be  other  and  better  than  they  have  been, 
for  the  world  cannot  pass  through  such  a  whirlwind 
and  fire  without  testing  both  the  substance  and  the 
forms  of  its  faith.  A  chapter  in  the  history  of  faith 
which  has  lasted  for  many  years  has  come  to  an 
end,  and  a  fresh  chapter,  with  an  accent  of  its  own, 
has  begun.  Already  a  few  lines  of  it  are  legible,  and 
we  see  that  what  is  eternal  in  the  religious  life  of  man 
is  beginning  to  appear  in  a  new  setting.  Now,  as  of 
old,  amid  the  overturning  of  history  and  the  storms 
of  human  fate,  our  little  systems  rise  and  pass  away, 
but  the  Eternal*  Christ  lives,  and  we  need  not  fear 
to  follow  the  ways  of  the  Spirit. 

"The  letter  fails,   the  systems  fall, 
And  every  symbol  wanes; 
The  Spirit  overbrooding  all, 
Eternal  Love  remains." 


ENGLAND  AND  AMERICA 

"Then    said    Jonathan    unto    David,    Whatsoever    thy    soul 
desireth,  I  will  even  do  it  for  thee." — i  Sam.  xx.  4. 

YESTERDAY  the  Lord  Mayor  of  London 
marked  with  stately  and  appropriate  observ- 
ance the  first  anniversary  of  the  entrance  of  America 
into  the  world-war.  It  was  a  memorable  occasion, 
and  no  one  who  attended  that  historic  function  will 
ever  forget  its  spirit  of  comradeship,  its  intense  but 
quiet  thoughtfulness,  its  resolute  confidence,  and  its 
wide  outlook  and  interpretation.  Thinkers  from 
both  sides  of  the  sea  read  the  meaning  of  the  day  in 
its  larger  aspects  and  in  its  bearing  on  the  future 
course  of  world  events.  Looking  before  and  after, 
they  agreed  that  no  event  in  this  vast  tragedy  is  of 
profounder  significance  or  more  full  of  promise  of 
blessing  for  the  days  that  lie  ahead. 

Surely  it  is  not  inappropriate  for  us  to  remember 
that  day  in  the  City  Temple,  whose  pulpit  is  itself 
a  symbol  of  that  which  the  day  means — the  soli- 
darity of  the  English-speaking  race.  And  it  is  alto- 
gether fitting  and  proper  that  we  should  do  so  on  the 
day  of  prayer,  because  the  issues  involved  in  this  war 
are  not  merely  political,  nor  even  social,  but  moral, 
spiritual,  religious.  As  about  the  walls  of  Troy 
Homer  saw  two  battles  raging,  one  on  the  earth  be- 

34 


ENGLAND  AND  AMERICA  35 

tween  Greeks  and  Trojans,  and  another  in  the  view- 
less air  between  gods  and  goddesses,  just  so  those 
who  have  eyes  to  see  discern  in  the  grim  horror  of 
this  war,  above  it,  through  it,  behind  it,  a  contest  of 
spiritual  forces.  It  is  not  a  mere  scramble,  not  a 
brawl  in  the  dark,  but  a  clash  of  ideals,  a  conflict 
of  influences  that  can  never  be  at  peace  while  God 
is  God  and  man  is  man. 

Think  it  all  through,  and  at  bottom,  the  war  is 
religious.  If  our  enemies  are  right,  our  religion  is 
wrong,  our  faith  a  fiction,  our  philosophy  false — 
yes,  justice  is  a  dream,  and  righteousness  a  delusion. 
Then  might  is  right,  the  battle  is  to  the  strongest 
and  the  race  to  the  swiftest,  and  the  more  ruthless 
and  unscrupulous  we  are  the  better.  By  the  same 
token,  if  our  religion  is  right,  if  God  is  a  reality,  and 
the  order  of  the  world  is  moral,  our  enemies  are 
wrong!  The  very  stars  in  their  courses  are  against 
them,  and  their  seeming  triumph  can  be  only  tem- 
porary. Thus,  if  we  read  this  event  aright,  we  shall 
make  note  of  it  less  as  a  celebration  than  as  a  con- 
secration, a  sacrament — in  the  old  and  true  meaning 
of  the  word — ^that  is,  an  oath  of  allegiance,  a  high 
vow  to  a  holy  cause,  renewing  our  pledge  to  strive 
unto  death  if  need  be  for  the  security  and  sanctity  of 
the  world. 

Such  was  the  mood,  the  spirit,  the  faith  with  which 
America  entered  the  war — reluctantly,  it  may  be,  but 
deliberately,  in  obedience  to  the  obligations  of  right- 
eousness and  in  the  service  of  an  ideal.  Slowly,  sol- 
emnly, with  deep  searching  of  heart,  she  dedicated 


S6  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

her  power,  her  manhood,  her  resources,  her  all  to  the 
principle — a  dream,  if  you  choose  to  call  it  such — 
and  not  even  the  malignant  ingenuity  of  our  common 
enemy  has  so  far  been  able  to  discover  or  invent  a 
selfish  or  sordid  motive  for  her  act.  There  were 
historic  reasons  for  her  hesitation;  but  once  she  saw 
that  the  fundamental  laws  and  liberties  of  humanity 
were  in  peril,  everything  gave  way — prejudice,  policy, 
pride,  predilection,  everything — and  however  long 
the  war  may  be,  however  horrible,  no  one  can  now 
doubt  that  the  advent  of  America  in  the  grand  Al- 
liance of  free  peoples  turned  the  balance,  decided  the 
issue,  and  sealed  the  doom  of  the  most  ambitious, 
barbarous,  lawless  autocracy  that  has  defamed  the 
history  of  the  modern  world. 

Those  who  look  below  the  surface  of  the  present 
war  discern  three  ideals  struggling  for  mastery  of 
the  world.  First,  the  ideal  symbolised  by  Prussia, 
the  doctrine  of  power,  ruthless  in  action  and  un- 
scrupulous in  negotiation — power  not  only  of  the 
sword,  but  of  a  highly  trained  and  specialised  knowl- 
edge. Second,  the  ideal  of  Bolshevism,  the  doctrine 
of  class  war,  equally  ruthless,  based  on  force,  and 
ending  in  anarchy  and  red  revolution.  Third,  the 
principle  of  the  Commonwealth,  the  doctrine  of  "the 
application  to  the  field  of  government  and  social  pol- 
icy of  the  law  of  human  brotherhood,  of  the  duty  of 
man  to  his  neighbour,  near  and  far."  There  is  no 
need  to  say  what  the  choice  of  our  common  race  is 
between  these  conflicting  ideals.  Already  we  have 
made  it,  and  we  mean  to  stand  to  it.     If  either  of 


ENGLAND  AND  AMERICA  37 

the  first  two  ideals  should  prevail,  it  needs  no  prophet 
to  foretell  that  there  would  be  neither  songs  nor 
dreams  nor  any  joyous  and  free  things  any  more,  but 
only  slavery  to  lawless  and  merciless  power.  There- 
fore, for  the  sake  of  an  opportunity  to  grow  the 
wings  of  the  spirit,  we  must  resist  to  the  uttermost 
the  Blonde  Beast  that  would  put  an  end  to  all  the 
high  hopes  of  our  race  in  its  struggle  to  be  free. 
What  though  we  fall  and  die  in  such  a  struggle,  if 
our  cause  wins  there  will  be  songs  again,  and  our 
sons  will  reahse  some  of  the  beauty  of  the  dreams 
we  all  have  dreamed.  Perhaps,  by  our  sacrifice,  the 
tie  will  be  strengthened  by  which  humanity  will  be 
so  drawn  together,  and  so  consecrated,  that  war 
itself  shall  cease  to  be,  following  Him  who  came  to 
give  His  life  a  ransom  for  many,  and,  losing  it,  found 
it.  For  surety  there  is  something  of  His  spirit  in 
the  heroic  sacrifice  of  humanity  for  an  ideal,  in  the 
willingness  of  men  to  lay  down  their  lives  for  others 
and  for  a  future  their  dying  eyes  will  not  see. 

Now,  consider.  The  entrance  of  America  into  the 
war  was  also  her  entrance  into  the  world,  the  aboli- 
tion of  her  historic  policy  of  isolation,  the  linking 
of  the  Old  World  and  the  New,  bringing  to  the 
council  chamber  of  the  future  the  new-world  outlook, 
insight,  and  point  of  view.  What  this  will  mean  no 
one  can  foresee  in  detail,  save  that  both  the  Old 
World  and  the  New  will  be  different,  drawn  closer 
together  with  such  an  interchange  of  ideas  and  such 
an  infusion  of  spiritual  influences  as  no  prophet  can 
forecast.     Not  simply  the  map  of  the  world,  but 


S8  JHE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

the  spiritual  geography  of  the  race  will  be  altered,  in 
ways  beyond  our  anticipation;  but  chiefly,  perhaps,  in 
the  growth  and  ripening  of  a  world-consciousness,  a 
sense  of  the  common  interest  and  obligation  of  hu- 
manity. We  shall  think  differently,  feel  differently, 
and  nothing  human  will  be  remote  or  alien  to  us. 
Larger  obligations  will  command  us;  deeper  sym- 
pathies will  stir  us;  national  bigotry  will  give  way 
before  intelligent  understanding;  and  our  local  loyal- 
ties will  be  lifted,  without  being  erased,  into  a  wider 
human  fellowship. 

Truly,  it  is  nothing  else  than  the  turning  of  a  new 
page  of  history,  the  opening  of  a  new  chapter  in  the 
social,  political,  intellectual,  and  spiritual  life  of  man- 
kind. As  the  Crusades  of  olden  time  unified  Europe 
and  from  feudalism  evolved  nationahsm,  so  this,  the 
greatest  humanitarian  crusade  in  history,  will  unify 
the  world,  and  from  a  narrow  nationalism  evoke  an 
international  mind,  conscience,  fellowship,  co-opera- 
tion. Not  all  at  once,  not  without  difficulty,  but 
slowly,  surely,  inevitably  racial  rancours,  national 
animosities,  and  sectarian  pettiness  will  yield  to  the 
pressure  of  world-obligation  and  community  of  in- 
terest, and  men  will  think  in  terms  of  one  humanity 
and  one  Christianity.  At  any  rate,  the  world  will 
be  smaller  than  heretofore,  and  the  injury  of  one 
will  be  more  keenly  felt  as  the  hurt  of  all,  because 
by  a  common  peril  and  a  common  sacrifice  we  have 
been  made  more  aware  of  our  kinship  and  obligation. 

Naturally  in  this  drawing  together  of  the  world  in 
a  new  sense  of  need  and  sympathy  and  common  un- 


ENGLAND  AND  AMERICA  39 

dertaking,  we  first  discover  those  nearest  to  us  in 
neighbourhood,  in  blood,  in  language,  and  ideals;  and 
so  when  America  entered  the  war  her  nearest  neigh- 
bour was  her  motherland.  Not  for  a  moment  do  we 
forget  our  other  Allies^ — least  of  all  France,  who 
aided  us  in  other  days,  and  whose  dauntless  valour 
and  heroic  sacrifice  make  it  an  honour  to  stand  by  her 
side — yet  it  is  none  the  less  true  that  the  outstanding 
aspect  of  this  event  is  that  it  proclaims  the  solidarity 
of  the  English-speaking  peoples.  It  is  like  a  dream 
come  true,  the  answer  to  the  call  set  to  impassioned 
music  by  Lord  Tennyson  in  1852,  in  a  poem  entitled 
"Hands  All  Round,"  which  he  revised  in  1882,  when 
Queen  Victoria  escaped  death,  and,  oddly  enough,  in 
its  final  form  two  thrilling  stanzas  were  omitted.  Let 
me  revive  one  of  them  to-day  because  it  is  so  timely: 

"Gigantic  daughter  of  the  West, 

Drink  we  to  thee  across  the  flood; 
We  know  thee  most,  we  love  thee  best — 

For  art  not  thou  of  British  blood? 
Should  War's  mad  blast  again  be  blown, 

Permit  not  thou  the  tyrant  Powers 
To  fight  thy  mother  here  alone, 

But  let  thy  broadsides  roar  with  ours, 
Hands  all  round! 
God  the  tyrant's  cause  confound! 
To  our  great  kinsmen  of  the  West,  my  friends, 
And  the  great  name  of  England,  round  and  round." 

While  the  Motherland  was  not  fighting  alone,  she 
was  fighting  for  her  life,  and  what  a  revolution  has 


40  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

been  wrought  in  our  thinking  and  feeling!  To-day 
the  debates  that  divided  us  in  times  agone  seem  like 
the  vague,  half-remembered  dreams  of  some  previous 
state  of  existence.  They  are  erased  and  forgotten. 
In  the  clearer  light  of  time  all  see  that  in  the  war 
of  the  Revolution  it  was  America  that  was  fighting 
for  the  old  British  principle,  and  that  it  was  never 
a  war  between  the  two  peoples.  Instead,  it  was  the 
blunder  of  a  German  king  and  a  stupid  minister  over 
the  protest  of  men  like  Pitt  and  Burke,  and  England 
ought  to  have  been  defeated — if  for  no  other  reason, 
because  she  hired  so  many  Germans  and  sent  them  to 
fight  us.  No  matter;  an  empire  so  vast  and  with 
interests  so  diverse  would  have  been  top-heavy  and 
unwieldy.  But  the  real  empire  of  a  common  culture, 
a  common  political  idea,  and  a  common  spiritual 
inheritance  remains,  far  more  important,  as  it  is  more 
imperishable,  than  any  political  entity. 

Of  our  second  war  the  least  said  the  better  for 
both  sides.  No  Englishman,  no  American,  can  look 
back  upon  the  miserable  muddle-headedness  which  led 
to  the  war  of  1812  without  a  blush  of  shame  and 
regret.  The  only  good  thing  about  It  was  the  peace 
with  which  it  ended,  whereby  the  principle  of  arbi- 
tration was  brought  for  the  first  time  into  our  history, 
and  it  has  kept  us  at  peace  for  more  than  a  hundred 
years.^  Meanwhile,  on  the  longest  frontier  in  the 
world  the  guns  kept  rusting  until  at  last  they  van- 
ished, and  if  there  are  now  two  flags  there  is  but 

M    Short    History    of    Anglo-American    Relations,    by    H.    S, 
Perrie. 


ENGLAND  AND  AMERICA  41 

one  civilisation;  and  so  It  will  always  be.  How 
ancient  all  this  history  Is,  how  remote  from  the  spirit 
and  mood  of  the  hour,  and  If  we  recall  It  to-day  It  Is 
the  better  to  see  how  far  we  have  journeyed  and  how 
close  we  have  been  brought  together.  No  man  of  us 
but  feels  that  the  future  of  freedom  Is  more  secure 
now  that  these  two  peoples  are  actually  united  in 
arms,  as  they  have  always  been  one  in  arts,  aims, 
and  Ideals.  Some  of  us  recall  the  words  of  Emerson, 
spoken  In  Manchester  in  1847,  seeing  them  fulfilled 
before  our  eyes: — 

"This  aged  England,  with  the  possessions,  honours,  and 
trophies,  and  also  the  infirmities  of  a  thousand  years  gath- 
ering around  her,  irretrievably  committed  as  she  now  is  to 
many  old  customs  which  cannot  be  suddenly  changed,  pressed 
upon  by  the  transitions  of  trade  and  new  and  all  incal- 
culable modes,  fabrics,  arts,  machines,  and  competing  popu- 
lations— I  see  her  not  dispirited,  not  weak,  but  well  re- 
membering that  she  has  seen  dark  days  before ;  indeed,  with 
a  kind  of  instinct  that  she  sees  a  little  better  in  a  cloudy 
day,  and  that  in  storm  of  battle  and  calamity  she  has  a  se- 
cret vigour  and  a  pulse  like  a  cannon.  I  see  her  in  her  old 
age,  not  decrepit,  but  young,  and  still  daring  to  believe  in 
her  power  of  endurance  and  expansion.  Seeing  this,  I  say. 
All  hail !  mother  of  nations,  mother  of  heroes,  with  strength 
still  equal  to  the  time;  still  wise  to  entertain  and  swift  to 
execute  the  policy  which  the  mind  and  heart  of  mankind  re- 
quire in  the  present  hour." 

Mother  of  nations,  indeed;  mother  of  heroes,  of 
poets,  of  prophets,  and  of  saints;  but  mother  of 
free  and  enlightened  parliaments  also,  uniting  the 


42  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

aristocratic  ideal  with  the  democratic  aspiration;  love 
of  liberty  with  reverence  for  law;  sturdy,  strong, 
enduring;  nobly  independent;  with  a  genius  for  justice 
and  a  spirit  of  sportsmanship — fair  play  an  article 
of  her  religion;  a  generous  enemy,  a  faithful  ally;  a 
land  of  wealth  and  worth  and  worship,  where  men 
measure  themselves  against  men  for  the  mastery  of 
the  fruits  of  the  earth  and  the  trophies  of  thought 
under  laws  which  all  make  and  obey;  the  greatest 
empire  the  world  has  known,  now  in  life  and  death 
grapple  for  the  existence  of  the  civilisation  which  it 
did  so  much  to  create  and  extend.  And  now  the 
daughterland  stands  by  her  side,  joining  hands  to  de- 
fend the  common  historic  tradition,  the  old  high 
inheritance  of  liberty  and  of  law. 

"I  think  that  all  your  years  led  up  to  this,  and  all  your  lives. 

I  think  it  was  for  this  that,  worlds  ago,  you  came  to  great- 
ness. 

Your  every  man,  of  all  your  times,  was  born  and  lived  and 
died  to  have  his  part  in  the  great  march  of  things  that 
led  to  this. 

It  was  for  this  you  gathered  lands  and  kept  the  seas. 

Fires  on  the  Druid  altars  burned  for  this,  and  strange  ships 
learned  your  harbours. 

For  this  you  broke  new  roads  and  kept  old  faiths. 

I  think  your  winds  have  always  told  of  this. 

I  think  for  this  that  all  your  rains  were  tears  and  all  your 
sunsets  banners." 

If  only  you  could  know  the  admiration  with  which 
we  saw  Britain  make  her  great  decision  in   1914, 


ENGLAND  AND  AMERICA  43 

casting  cost  to  the  winds  on  behalf  of  the  civilisation 
of  Europe  in  an  hour  of  destiny!  For  some  of  us 
those  three  years  were  years  of  agony;  but  we  never 
ceased  to  pay  homage  to  our  hearts  in  the  heroic 
unselfishness  of  Britain,  her  scorn  of  base  dishonour, 
her  regard  for  the  laws  of  nations,  her  grim  tenacity, 
her  almost  superhuman  endurance,  and  her  unpre- 
cedented sacrifice.  To-day  we  of  the  New  World  re- 
new our  vow  that  while  there  is  breath  in  our  bodies 
and  blood  in  our  veins,  those  dead — those  innumer- 
able and  heroic  dead — shall  not  have  died  in  vain, 
and  that  liberty,  justice,  and  mercy  shall  not  perish 
from  the  earth  I  To  this  we  have  pledged  our  power 
and  our  sacred  honour,  and  if  we  were  slow  in  start- 
ing we  shall  not  turn  back  nor  turn  aside  until  the 
world  is  fit  for  free  men  to  live  in,  whatever  the  cost 
may  be. 

Our  differences  are  superficial;  our  unities  funda- 
mental. In  the  tragedy  of  the  trenches,  on  the  grey 
solitudes  of  the  sea,  in  the  halls  of  a  thousand  hos- 
pitals, in  blessed  ministries  of  healing  and  of  com- 
fort, in  the  consecration  of  a  common  sacrifice  of 
our  best,  we  shall  know  each  other  even  as  we  are 
known,  heart  to  heart.  United  in  freedom,  in  faith, 
in  friendship,  each  loyal  to  the  old,  high  ideal  of  our 
race,  we  shall  together  fulfil  the  mighty  task  which 
the  God  of  History  has  committed  into  our  hands, 
the  keeping  of  the  future  freedom  and  peace  of  the 
world — ^not  by  conquest,  but  by  co-operation,  not  by 
war,  but  by  law. 


44  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

Two  Empires  by  the  sea, 
Two  peoples  great  and  free, 

One  anthem  raise. 
One  race  of  ancient  fame. 
One  tongue,  one  faith,  we  claim 
One  God  whose  glorious  name 

|We  love  and  praise. 


THE  RELIGION  OF  LINCOLN 

"Thou  shalt  love  the  Lord  thy  God  with  all  thy  heart, 
and  with  all  thy  soul,  and  with  all  thy  mind,  and  thy 
neighbour  as  thyself." — Mark  xii.  30,  31. 

MY  talk,  to-day  is  in  response  to  many  requests, 
and  I  trust  it  is  not  altogether  inappropriate 
in  view  of  the  celebration  of  the  birthday  of  Lincoln 
during  the  week.  He  is  the  supreme  figure,  so  far, 
in  the  history  of  the  New  World,  its  great  prophetic 
character,  and  a  discussion  of  the  place  of  religion  in 
his  life  may  serve  a  double  purpose.  It  will  show 
us  a  mind  of  the  first  order  grappling  with  the  old 
eternal  issues  of  life  and  faith,  and  it  ought  to  give 
more  than  one  sidelight  on  the  spirit  and  growth 
of  the  land  whose  genius  he  embodied.  For,  when 
all  is  said,  it  is  in  the  character  of  our  great  men 
that  our  holiest  traditions  and  ideals  are  enshrined; 
and  the  spirit  of  Lincoln  is  the  spirit  of  America. 

.  There  was  never  a  truer  word  than  that  of  Carlyle 
when  he  said  that  the  religion  of  a  man  is  the  chief 
fact  concerning  him.  By  religion  he  meant,  as  he 
went  on  to  explain,  not  the  creed  to  which  he  sub- 
scribes or  otherwise  gives  his  assent;  not  that  neces- 
sarily, often  not  that  at  all — since  we  see  men  of  all 
degrees  of  worth  and  worthlessness  signing  all  man- 
ner of  creeds.    This  is  not  what  he  calls  religion,  this 

45 


46  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

assertion,  which  may  come  from  the  outworks  of  a 
man,  if  even  so  deep  as  that.  No;  by  religion  he 
meant  that  which  a  man  practically  believes,  lays  to 
heart — often  enough  without  asserting  it  to  himself 
— and  acts  upon,  and  therefore  knows,  concerning 
this  mysterious  universe,  and  his  duty  and  destiny  in 
it.  That  is  in  all  cases  the  primary  thing  in  him, 
and  creatively  determines  all  the  rest;  that  is  his 
religion.  If  you  know  that  about  a  man  you  know 
what  he  is  and  what  he  will  do. 

What  is  true  of  a  man  is  equally  true  of  a  people 
or  a  nation.  Some  of  you  recall  the  noble  words  of 
Emerson  in  the  closing  lines  of  his  chapter  on  Re- 
ligion in  his  English  Traits.  The  religion  of  Eng- 
land, is  it  in  the  Established  Church?  he  asks.  No. 
It  is  in  the  sects?  No.  Where  then  does  it  dwell? 
Ask,  first,  where  electricity  or  motion  or  thought 
dwell.  They  do  not  dwell  or  stay  at  all.  No  more 
can  you  put  your  finger  upon  the  elusive  thing  called 
religion,  which  is  the  life  of  God  in  the  soul  of  man, 
taking  all  the  forms  that  life  and  duty  take.  And 
then  follow  the  words:  "Yet,  if  religion  be  the 
doing  of  all  good,  and  for  its  sake  the  suffering  of  all 
evil,  that  divine  secret  has  existed  in  England  from 
the  days  of  Alfred  to  those  of  Florence  Nightingale, 
and  in  thousands  who  have  no  fame. 

So,  then,  it  is  for  this  primary  thing,  this  "divine 
secret"  in  Lincoln,  that  we  are  seeking;  the  faith  and 
principle  on  which  he  acted,  and  which  gave  form 
and  colour  to  his  character.  Where  is  it  to  be  found ! 
Not  in  his  use  of  Bible  imagery — though  the  cadences 


THE  RELIGION  OF  LINCOLN  47 

of  the  Great  Book  echoed  in  his  eloquence — nor  yet 
in  his  words  of  good-will  to  the  men  of  this  or  that 
sect;  but  in  the  fibre  of  his  soul,  the  qualities  of  his 
mind,  and  most  of  all  in  the  open  book  of  his  life. 
He  belonged  to  no  Church,  he  signed  no  creed — and 
he  has  told  us  the  reason  why.  Yet  he  was  pro- 
foundly religious,  and  his  faith  was  so  much  a  part 
of  his  very  being  that  one  must  analyse  the  man  to 
discover  it.  His  mind  was  so  moral,  and  his  morality 
so  intelligent,  as  Phillips  Brooks  said,  that  they  can- 
not be  set  the  one  over  against  the  other.  Had  he 
been  a  complex  man  it  would  be  easy  to  solve  the 
riddle.  Instead,  he  was  a  great  and  simple  man,  and 
like  all  simple  men  there  was  a  certain  mystery  about 
him — a  mystery  too  simple,  perhaps,  to  be  found 
out. 

Was  Lincoln  a-  Christian?  The  question  has  been 
much  debated,  but  the  answer  depends  on  what  we 
mean  by  a  Christian.  If  by  a  Christian  we  mean 
one  who  holds  to  certain  dogmas  about  Christ — 
the  manner  of  His  birth,  the  nature  of  His  person, 
and  the  works  He  wrought,  as  set  forth  in  the  creeds 
of  the  Church — then  Lincoln  was  not  a  Christian. 
He  was  a  deist,  if  not  a  fatalist,  in  his  thought,  and 
did  not  attain  to  faith  in  the  theology  of  the  Church 
— such  is  the  simple  fact,  and  by  that  test  he  was  not 
a  Christian.  But  if  by  a  Christian  we  mean  one  who 
honours  Christ  and  follows  Him  as  the  Teacher  of 
truth  and  the  Way-shower  of  life;  one  who  is  just, 
true,  merciful,  a  man  who  loves  his  fellow  men  and 
seeks  to  serve  them  in  the  spirit  of  Christ — then  Lin- 


48  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

coin  was  a  Christian.  If  to  have  the  spirit  of  Christ 
is  to  be  a  Christian,  then,  surely,  if  ever  of  any  one, 
we  may  say  of  Lincoln  that  he  was  a  Christian — a 
"Christ  in  miniature,"  as  Tolstoy  called  him.  It  is  a 
part  of  the  surprise  and  grandeur  of  his  life  that, 
with  his  early  scepticism  and  his  growing  cosmic 
piety,  he  should  be  accounted  one  of  the  most  Christ- 
like men  of  his  age. 

Now  it  takes  a  long  time  to  make  a  Lincoln,  and 
he  was  still  growing  when  he  died.  Indeed,  the  great- 
est thing  about  him  was  his  capacity  for  growth.  So 
that  what  may  be  said  of  his  religious  attitude  in  one 
period  of  his  life  would  not  describe  him  now.^  He 
was  a  young  man,  and  this  unsettlement  of  faith  was 
such  as  often  comes  to  young  men  who  think;  but 
Lincoln  was  not  a  man  to  stop  with  a  mere  denial 
of  the  faith  of  other  men.  No  great  and  deep  soul 
can  live  on  negations  alone.  In  the  midst  of  this 
uncertainty  his  sweetheart,  Annie  Rutledge,  died, 
plunging  him  into  abysmal  sorrow.  Thereafter,  to 
the  end,  her  image  lived  in  his  dreams,  wrapped  in 
the  sweet  and  awful  sadness  of  the  grave.  Then  fol- 
lowed disappointment,  defeat,  baffled  ambition,  and 
hard  struggle  with  the  hard  facts  of  life.     Despite 

*  The  story,  so  long  accepted,  that  Lincoln  as  a  youth  wrote 
an  essay  attacking  the  religion  of  Jesus,  which  one  of  his 
friends  burned,  lest  it  injure  his  political  prospects,  is  untrue. 
The  document  burned  was  not  a  theological  essay,  but  a  love- 
letter.  For  the  facts  see  a  book  which  it  was  my  honour  to 
edit  two  years  ago,  entitled  Personal  Recollections  of  Lincoln,  by 
H.  B.  Rankin. 


THE  RELIGION  OF  LINCOLN  49 

it  all,  or,  rather,  because  of  It,  Lincoln  grew  in 
strength  of  mind  and  depth  of  heart. 

After  years  of  meditation,  he  came  to  a  faith  of  his 
own — a  kind  of  sublime  moral  fatalism,  in  which 
right  and  truth  will  win  as  surely  as  suns  rise  and  set. 
This  faith  fed  his  soul  and  was  the  hidden  spring 
of  his  strength,  his  valour,  and  his  unbending  firm- 
ness. It  was  the  secret  of  his  character,  of  his  pa- 
tience, of  his  prophetic  insight,  and  of  his  melting 
pity.  Holding  to  the  moral  order  of  the  world,  he 
knew  that  truth  will  prevail  whatever  may  be  the  pos- 
ture of  the  hour.  Men  may  delay  it,  but  they  can 
in  nowise  stay  its  slow,  Inevitable  advance.  Upon 
this  faith  he  built  his  life — a  faith  in  which  there 
was  no  accident,  no  miracle,  and,  in  his  earlier  years, 
little  profit  in  prayer — and,  though  wind  and  flood 
beat  upon  it  with  fury,  he  could  not  be  moved.  In 
his  moods  of  melancholy,  which  were  many  and  black 
— the  shadow,  perhaps,  of  some  pre-natal  gloom  in 
the  soul  of  his  mother — he  threw  himself  upon  this 
confidence  and  found  rest;  not  so  much  in  formal 
prayer — though,  in  later  years,  that  became  first  a 
necessity,  then  a  habit — as  a  quiet,  inner  trust. 

No  doubt,  to  many  of  my  hearers,  as  to  myself, 
such  a  faith  seems  far  below  what  we  have  a  right  to 
hold.  But  if  you  would  understand  why  Lincoln 
found  no  other — until,  perhaps,  towards  the  end — 
you  must  know  the  quality  of  his  mind.  He  had  a 
profound  and  penetrating  intellect,  but  it  was  a  prac- 
tical mind,  more  contemplative  than  speculative,  and 
it  took  nothing  for  granted.    Of  the  skyey  genius  of 


50  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

Plato  and  Emerson  he  had  none.  Emerson  he  could 
not  understand.  For  him  the  sunlit  upland  where  our 
Yankee  Plato  walked  was  an  unknown  world.  No, 
Lincoln,  by  virtue  equally  of  his  temperament  and  his 
intellect,  lived  in  a  dim,  dun-coloured  world,  under  a 
sky  as  grey  as  a  tired  face.  He  was  a  logician,  albeit 
subdued,  at  times,  by  a  wondering,  meditative  pen- 
siveness  of  soul.  His  mind  was  slow,  cautious,  ultra- 
conservative,  and  such  a  mind  sees  life  for  less  than 
it  is.  Still,  it  deals  with  facts  as  they  are,  not  with 
theories,  and  is  content  to  take  one  step  at  a  time. 
Naturally,  to  such  a  man  faith  is  difficult,  and  many 
things  which  seem  clear  to  others  are  dim  to  him. 
One  finds  this  type  of  mind  most  often  among  men 
of  action.  A  thinker  may  take  wings,  but  a  man 
who  does  things  must  walk  on  the  earth,  sometimes  in 
the  midst  of  thorns.  Lincoln  thought  from  the 
ground  up,  thought  as  if  no  one  had  ever  thought 
before  him.  Often  his  thinking  carried  him  to  the 
border  of  that  awful  darkness,  that  obscurity  beyond 
knowledge  which  encompasses  on  all  sides  our  little 
ghmmering  field  of  knowledge.  Then  it  might  be 
seen  how  he  held  aloof,  how  certain  he  was  not  to 
abandon  the  ground  of  facts,  how  little  he  was 
tempted  to  invade  the  Unknown.  Always  he  fell 
back,  trusting  the  reality  of  the  moral  law  and  the 
Will  greater  than  himself,  whose  way  he  sought  to 
know.  For  such  a  mind,  when  it  comes  to  the  edge 
of  thought,  three  avenues  are  open — agnosticism, 
superstition,    and    faith;    and    while    Lincoln    was 


THE  RELIGION  OF  LINCOLN  61 

tempted  by  the  first  two,  he  was  wise  enough  to  go 
forward  led  by  a  dim,  great  Hand. 

Perhaps  the  humour  of  Lincoln  has  been  exagger- 
ated out  of  all  proportion  to  the  rest  of  his  faculties 
— because  of  its  sweetness  and  its  exceeding  aptness. 
Nevertheless,  it  was  a  part  of  his  religion,  as  it  must 
be  of  all  religion  that  is  sane.  Even  in  the  Hfe  of 
Jesus  there  trickles  a  rivulet  of  sweet,  dehcate,  rip- 
pling humour.  It  was  a  part  of  His  divine  sanity, 
and  some  of  His  words  cannot  be  interpreted  without 
seeing  between  the  lines  a  smile.  Humour  is  a  sense 
of  distance,  of  proportions,  of  limits,  of  values,  and 
properly  to  recognise  values  is  not  to  be  fooled  or 
frightened  in  this  valley  of  illusions.  Some  sects 
would  vanish  from  the  earth  if  their  adherents  had 
the  saving  sense  of  humour.  Some  dogmas  are  too 
funny  to  be  true.  As  Cicero  said  of  atheism,  it  is  as 
if  the  Iliad  of  Homer  had  just  happened  as  the  result 
of  tossing  the  Greek  alphabet  into  the  air.  Pan- 
theism, also,  is  open  to  similar  attack.  It  tells  us 
that  all  things  are  divine — which  is,  to  say  the  least, 
a  large  remark — but  when  we  come  to  meditate  on 
divine  oysters  and  crabs,  it  begins  to  be  absurd. 
Humour  pricks  the  bubble  and  it  explodes — for 
humour,  at  its  best,  is  of  the  very  essence  of  right 
reason. 

But  that  is  not  all.  For  all  his  fine  poise  of  reason 
and  his  wise  humour,  Lincoln,  like  all  other  mortals, 
was  at  bottom  a  mystic — that  is,  one  who  felt  that 
the  Unseen  has  secrets  which  are  known  only  to 
minds  fine  enough  and  pure  enough  to  see  and  hear 


52  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

them.  His  humour  kept  everything  in  its  place — 
including  himself.  It  taught  him  humility,  and  kept 
him  from  being  too  implacably  wise  concerning  things 
whereof  no  man  knoweth.  None  the  less,  there  was 
a  window  in  his  mind  open  towards  the  Unseen,  and 
through  it  came  influences  and  intimations  not  justi- 
fied by  his  relentless  logic — influences  softening  his 
fatalism  and  teaching  him  things  by  sight  and  sense 
unknown,  and  giving  his  spirit  a  nameless  grace. 
For  example,  one  has  only  to  study  his  dreams  to  see 
something  of  this  mystery.  He  set  little  store  by 
such  premonitions;  he  even  distrusted  them;  yet,  as 
a  fact,  at  times  of  danger  and  disaster  he  was  warned. 
Some  time  before  his  death  he  saw  himself  stretched 
upon  his  bier,  and  heard  the  sobs  of  the  mourners. 

It  was  this  seer-like  quality  of  soul,  so  to  name  it, 
hinted  to  us  in  his  dreams  and  forefeelings,  that  more 
and  more  swayed  Lincoln  toward  the  end,  softening 
all  that  was  hard  within  him  and  hardening  all  that 
was  soft.  For  the  spiritual  drama  of  his  life — like 
that  of  Thackeray — was  the  struggle  to  free  himself 
from  the  clutch  of  fatalism.  At  last,  after  a  bitter 
fight,  he  won  his  liberty — and  he  won  it  through 
prayer.  In  early  life,  as  has  been  said,  he  felt  that 
he  was  In  the  grasp  of  Iron  law,  and  the  awful  Su- 
preme Power  seemed  deaf  to  human  pleadings.  But 
in  the  terrible  days  of  Civil  War,  when  the  weight 
of  a  nation  rested  upon  his  soul,  when  foes  were  vic- 
torious and  friends  unstable — then  he  was  driven  to 
his  knees,  as  he  said,  because  he  had  nowhere  else 
to  go.    And  there  he  learned,  not  in  theory,  but  as 


THE  RELIGION  OF  LINCOLN  53 

a  fact,  that  God  is  not  deaf,  but  that  He  does  actually 
hear  and  help  those  who  seek  Him  with  honest  hearts. 
Words  of  faith  in  God,  of  belief  in  the  power  of 
prayer,  more  and  more  found  their  way  into  his  let- 
ters, his  speeches,  and  even  into  his  State  papers. 
Few  men  have  ever  felt  more  deeply  the  helplessness 
of  man  both  as  to  strength  and  wisdom,  and  the  help- 
fulness of  God  in  both.  Often  his  words  moved  with 
the  very  rhythm  and  cadence  of  the  Bible  music — 
for  the  Bible  was  his  constant  companion  in  those  dif- 
ficult years — and  it  is  thus  that  they  still  walk  up  and 
down  in  the  hearts  of  men.  No  man  of  state  in  his 
land  ever  made  so  profound  a  religious  impression 
and  appeal  as  Lincoln  did  in  his  last  years.  Amidst 
the  wild  hell  of  war  he  pleaded  for  mercy  and  the 
love  that  forgives,  and  the  very  soul  of  the  man 
shone  in  his  face  which  none  who  saw  it  can  forget. 

Carpenter,  the  artist  who  painted  his  portrait  in 
the  White  House,  asked  him  about  his  religion,  and 
Lincoln  replied:  "I  have  never  joined  any  church, 
but  when  any  church  will  inscribe  over  its  altar,  as 
its  sole  qualification  for  membership,  the  words  of  the 
Saviour,  *Thou  shalt  love  the  Lord  thy  God  with  all 
thy  heart  and  with  all  thy  soul,  and  thy  neighbour  as 
thyself,'  that  church  will  I  join  with  all  my  heart  and 
all  my  soul."  All  churches  inscribe  these  words  over 
their  altars,  but  they  inscribe  so  many  other  things 
that  the  gem  is  lost  in  the  setting — and,  alas,  the 
other  things  are  too  often  regarded  as  equally  im- 
portant. Lincoln  asked  that  all  else  be  erased  save 
love  of  God  and  love  of  man — and  some  day  the 


64  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

Church  will  be  wise  enough  to  do  it.  When  she  does 
so  she  will  be  following  her  Master,  and  men  like 
Lincoln  will  not  be  kept  out  by  dogmas  and  rites 
which  they  cannot  honestly  accept. 

Nothing  more  noble  than  the  character  of  Lincoln 
has  ever  been  seen  in  the  New  World.  The  nearer 
one  comes  to  him,  the  more  one  knows  about  him, 
the  more  stainless  and  just  he  seems  to  be.  All 
men  now  know  that  the  saving  of  the  Union — with- 
out slavery  if  possible,  with  slavery  if  necessary — 
was  the  one  overmastering  passion  of  his  life,  and 
that  whoever  else  might  lose  heart,  let  go  of  faith, 
or  sink  into  self-seeking,  that  would  Lincoln  never! 
Here,  in  the  elemental  qualities  of  the  man — his 
courage,  his  honour,  his  loyalty  to  the  ideal,  his  melt- 
ing pity  and  his  delicate  justice,  his  scorn  of  coward- 
ice, his  instinctive  championship  of  the  weak;  here 
the  faith  on  which  he  acted  is  unveiled  as  it  could 
never  be  in  any  list  of  dogmas.  His  life,  like  the 
life  of  the  Master,  was  founded  upon  love — and  the 
justice  born  of  love.  That  love  made  him  suffer, 
as  love  always  does,  and  in  the  fiery  furnace  of  that 
suffering  he  was  purified,  exalted,  and  taught  the 
truth  of  all  truths  the  greatest — that  God  is  love. 

No  man  ever  had  a  loftier  conception  of  the 
sanctity  of  law,  of  the  sacramental  meaning  of  the 
State,  than  Lincoln  had.  His  oath  of  office  was  a 
vow  of  consecration.  As  meditative  as  Marcus 
Aurelius  and  as  blithe  as  Mark  Twain,  as  simple  as 
i^sop  yet  as  subtle  as  an  Oriental,  a  calm,  grave, 
strong  man,  formidable  and  sad,  he  stood  in  the 


THE  RELIGION  OF  LINCOLN  55 

White  House  a  high  priest  of  Humanity,  an  awe- 
struck ministrant  in  the  temple  of  God  performing 
the  rites  of  liberty,  justice,  and  pity — presiding  over 
an  offering  of  blood  and  fire  and  tears!  He  was  a 
man  of  God,  plain,  homely,  kindly,  who  knew  that 
humanity  is  deeply  wounded  somewhere  and  tried  to 
heal  it — and  of  his  fame  there  will  be  no  end. 


HOLDING  THE  WORLD  TOGETHER 

"He    is    before    all    things,    and    by    Him    all    things    hold 
together." — Col,  i.   17. 

THE  epistle  to  the  Church  at  Colosse  may  not 
inaptly  be  called  the  gospel  of  the  Cosmic 
Christ.  It  Is  a  profound  and  wonderful  letter,  the 
purpose  of  which  is  to  show  that  Christ,  so  far  from 
being  unrelated  to  the  universe,  is  the  clue,  if  not  the 
key,  to  any  satisfying  interpretation  of  it.  Written 
in  a  time  of  world  decay,  when  the  Roman  Empire 
was  reeling  to  its  ruin,  it  proclaims  Christ  as  the 
Divine  life  which  not  only  created  all  things,  but 
which  holds  the  world  together.  Not  as  a  proposi- 
tion of  philosophy  does  St.  Paul  state  this  truth,  but 
as  a  vision  born  of  a  vivid  fellowship  with  things 
immortal;  and  it  will  mean  much  to  us  who  live  in  a 
beshattered  world  if  we  can  lay  hold  of  it  and  rest 
upon  it.  Here  is  a  faith  equal  to  any  calamity,  and 
we  need  Its  breadth  and  grasp  and  light  to-day,  if  only 
to  keep  ourselves  from  going  to  pieces  in  the  shock 
and  tragedy  of  world-war. 

What  Is  the  basis  of  this  far-reaching,  all-trans- 
figuring faith?  Happily  it  Is  not  far  to  seek  If  we 
have  a  heart  for  high  adventure,  and  may  be  briefly 
stated.  One  thing  man,  in  his  sanity,  dare  not  think 
— that  the  low,  the  vile,  the  cynical,  the  selfish  have 

56 


HOLDING  THE  WORLD  TOGETHER       57 

read  the  meaning  of  life  aright,  and  that  the  lofty, 
the  pure,  the  heroic  and  true-hearted  have  read  it 
amiss.  This,  even  in  the  folly  which  is  our  only  wis- 
dom, we  dare  not  think;  that  way  madness  lies.  St. 
Paul  not  only  avoided  this  ultimate  madness,  but  he 
dared  to  read  the  meaning  of  life  and  the  world 
prophetically,  that  is  through  what  is  highest  in  it, 
which  is  the  one  sure  path  to  the  highest  Truth. 
What  is  the  highest  fact  of  which  man  has  any 
knowledge?  Surely  there  is  no  one  to  deny  that 
Jesus  is  the  strongest,  whitest,  sweetest  soul  the  earth 
has  known,  and  that  His  life  is  the  sovereign  fact  of 
the  world.  Hence  the  insight  of  St.  Paul,  and  the 
daring  of  his  faith  which  found  in  the  life  of  Jesus 
a  revelation  of  the  eternal  purpose  of  the  world, 
the  secret  of  its  cohesive  power,  and  the  prophecy  of 
its  creative  ideal. 

Now,  consider  the  validity  of  this  vision  as  over 
against  all  materialisms,  pessimisms,  cynicisms,  and 
scepticisms.  In  such  a  universe  as  materialism  de- 
scribes, the  life  of  Jesus,  His  character,  His  spirit, 
would  be  not  simply  an  absurdity,  but  an  impossi- 
bility. There  would  be  nothing  to  inspire  it,  nothing 
to  sustain  it,  nothing  to  uphold  and  justify  it.  In- 
deed, it  would  be  an  effect  without  a  cause,  a  stream 
without  a  spring,  a  melody  without  a  motif.  There- 
fore, for  St.  Paul,  the  very  fact  that  the  universe 
produced,  or  even  permitted  such  a  life,  was  the 
refutation  of  every  philosophy  of  despair.  What 
wonder  then  that  the  fact  that  out  of  the  darkness 
such  a  Face  could  rise  and  shine,  became  the  master- 


58  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

light  of  all  his  seeing  and  the  inspiration  of  his 
unconquerable  assurance.  With  St.  Paul  the  mean- 
ing of  this  fact  was  no  thin  theory,  but  an  actual 
reality,  victoriously  tested  in  his  own  life  of  storm 
and  stress,  of  struggle  and  triumph.  The  vision  of 
God  in  Christ  unified  his  nature;  it  held  his  life  to- 
gether, giving  him  strength  in  weakness,  fortitude  in 
trial,  and  victory  in  defeat — and  thus  it  became  his 
Gospel. 

Here  is  the  one  adequate  faith,  if  only  we  can 
realise  it  for  ourselves;  the  only  faith  equal  to  the 
incredible  tragedy  in  which  we  are  groping  our  way, 
stumbling  in  the  dark.  How  much  we  need  this 
insight,  as  a  thread  of  light  to  guide  us  through  the 
bewildering  confusion  of  to-day,  no  one  need  be 
told.  Suddenly,  by  a  terrible  blow  of  world  calamity, 
our  little  theories,  policies,  and  expediencies  have 
been  brushed  aside,  and  we  are  confronted  by  the  fact 
that  the  forces  in  which  we  had  trusted  to  hold  the 
world  together  are  impotent  to  do  so.  As  some  one 
has  said,  the  hoops  of  humanity  have  been  broken, 
and  the  barrel  is  collapsed.  Slowly,  tie  after  tie  has 
given  way  until  little  seems  left  save  the  law  of  the 
jungle,  brute  Force  on  one  side  and  wild  Revolution 
on  the  other — to  such  ferocious  cave-men  issue  have 
events  led  us.  Think  back  a  moment,  and  you  will 
see  how  frail  those  ties  were,  like  ropes  of  sand,  and 
why  certain  clever  dogmas,  so  talkative  four  years 
ago,  are  now  silent  and  forgotten.  What  were  some 
of  the  ties  in  which  we  had  been  trusting  to  hold  the 
world  together? 


HOLDING  THE  WORLD  TOGETHER   59 

Let  us  see  a  little.  On  Mars'  Hill  the  Apostle 
said  that  God  has  made  of  one  blood  all  nations  of 
men  to  dwell  on  the  face  of  the  earth,  and  has  deter- 
mined the  bounds  of  their  habitation;  and  that  is  lit- 
erally true,  shocking  as  it  may  be  to  our  aristocratic 
vanity.  Go  back  twenty  generations,  and  you  will 
discover  that  you  have  more  than  a  hundred  thousand 
ancestors;  go  back  fifty  generations,  and  you  will  find 
more  than  five  million  foresires.  There  is  not  in 
Western  Europe  a  neolithic  relic  that  Is  not  a  family 
relic  of  every  one  of  us.  The  blood  in  our  veins  has 
handled  it.  Truly  we  are  all  akin,  and  our  blood 
is  mixed  beyond  tracing,  but  ties  of  flesh  and  blood 
cannot  hold  the  world  together,  much  less  bring  in 
the  kingdom  of  heaven.  From  the  military  trenches 
abroad  to  the  economic  trenches  at  home,  from  the 
clash  of  classes  to  the  divorce  courts — the  Haves 
warring  against  the  Have-nots,  and  the  riot  of  lusts, 
passions,  envies,  hates,  and  greeds — the  world  seems 
a  discordant,  struggling  mass  with  nothing  to  hold  it 
together.  So  much  so,  that  the  idea  of  any  real  unity 
and  amity  often  seems  like  a  dream 

Fit  to  take  lodgings  in  a  head 
That's  to  be  let  unfurnished. 

Many  had  come  to  think  that  what  we  call  civilisa- 
tion had  brought  mankind  to  a  point  of  moral  re- 
finement, to  a  degree  of  reciprocity,  where  it  would 
no  longer  resort  to  brute  force  to  advance  its  interests 
or  settle  its  disputes.  How  vain  this  hope  was  the 
awful  facts  make  plain.    Others  thought  that  the  vie- 


60  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

torles  of  science,  to  say  nothing  of  the  triumphs  of 
social  organisation,  had  made  such  a  world-shaking 
war  as  that  now  raging  Impossible.  But  science,  so 
far  from  uniting  mankind,  has  placed  new  instruments 
of  destruction  in  the  hands  of  men,  making  the 
slaughter  more  hellish  than  ever  before.  In  the  same 
way.  Education,  in  which  so  many  trusted,  has  failed 
to  hold  humanity  together.  Indeed,  the  nations  now 
locked  in  a  death-grapple  on  the  field  of  conflict  are 
the  most  cultivated  and  refined  nations  of  the  modern 
world.  The  English  people,  whose  culture  is  so 
broad-based,  so  finely  poised  and  humane;  the 
French,  so  keen  of  intellect,  so  quick  and  intuitive  of 
insight;  the  great,  patient,  brooding  mind  of  Ger- 
many, so  rich  in  science  and  music;  the  genius  of 
Italy,  so  fertile  in  shapes  of  beauty;  the  new,  uprising 
culture  of  America,  so  full  of  promise — these  are  the 
nations  now  struggling  on  bloody  fields  in  a  fury  of 
war.  We  do  not  chide,  we  only  grieve,  the  while  we 
lay  to  heart  the  fact  that  education  may  train  men, 
but,  unless  In  the  future  it  is  to  be  something  dif- 
ferent, it  cannot  bind  them  together. 

Commerce  has  shown  Itself  powerless  to  hold  men 
and  nations  together.  Times  without  number  we 
were  told  that  the  war  we  were  all  fearing  would 
never  come,  because  the  unseen  empire  of  finance 
would  not  let  It  be.  Norman  Angell  argued  this 
thesis  brilliantly,  bringing  forward  a  mass  of  facts 
to  prove  that  war  never  pays  because  Its  advantages, 
even  to  the  victors,  are  illusory;  and  the  present  war 
has  not  disproved  his  argument.    Yet  the  present  war 


HOLDING  THE  WORLD  TOGETHER      61 

Is  a  fact,  and  we  now  know  that  nations  will  fight 
regardless  of  cost,  just  because  some  things  are  price- 
less; and  that  some  nations  will  deliberately  go  to  war 
to  defend  or  extend  their  trade.  No ;  the  jealousies 
of  commerce  are  no  guarantee  against  war,  and  an- 
other theory  goes  glimmering  in  face  of  the  reality. 
Business  does  not  make  men  brothers;  It  makes  them 
rivals.  Since  we  cannot  rely  upon  ties  of  trade  to 
unite  humanity,  we  must  turn  to  other  and  higher 
forces,  if  perchance  we  may  find  an  Influence  strong 
enough  to  bind  the  race  together. 

Socialism,  with  its  vague  humanitarian  mysticism 
and  its  fine  rhetoric  of  a  cosmopolitan  philosophy, 
collapsed  like  a  house  of  cards  In  a  storm.  The 
Church  failed,  having  lost  the  power  to  uplift  and 
guide  the  nations,  to  draw  men  together,  and  to 
base  human  life  on  love  of  man  for  his  fellows. 
Indeed,  the  Church  itself  is  spht  into  countless  sects, 
more  schismatic  than  any  state ;  It  cannot  hold  itself 
together.  Just  now  it  is  yearning  for  union,  and 
some  are  busy  with  dicker  and  compromise  looking 
to  that  end — but  to  little  avail.  Often  Its  planning 
and  dickering  in  the  effort  to  find  a  basis  of  union 
resembles  a  horse-trade.  Last  autumn  I  heard  a 
sceptic  denouncing  the  Church  on  Boston  Common, 
and  a  vast  crowd  applauded  his  eloquence.  He  used 
bitter  words,  most  of  which  were  terribly  true,  but 
he  amazed  me  by  arguing  that  it  Is  absurd  to  say  that 
the  Jews  crucified  Jesus,  because  no  set  of  men  would 
be  so  stupid  as  to  crucify  one  so  lovable  and  so  holy! 
Thus  do  men  confess  Him  In  whom  our  hope  hes, 


62  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

judging  life  by  His  standards,  and  denouncing  the 
Church  because  it  is  so  unlike  Him;  because  it  does 
not  act  as  He  acted,  whose  life  was  one  of  love  and 
service,  of  pity  and  good-will. 

Manifestly  this  much  is  clear:  our  race  cannot  be 
held  together  by  outward  pressure,  but  must  find  its 
centre  of  amity  in  some  inward  spiritual  life.  Here, 
then,  is  our  clue,  and  if  we  are  to  find  the  ultimate 
unity  underlying  all  the  diversities  and  strifes  of 
humanity,  we  must  seek  it,  not  in  the  welter  of  lower 
interests,  but  in  the  Divine  life  which  haunts  us  while 
it  indwells  us.  Far  above  the  red  fields  of  war, 
down  below  the  din  of  the  wrangling  street,  higher 
than  all  sects,  deeper  than  all  dogmas,  there  is  a  life 
of  the  Spirit  common  to  all  mankind — ^potential  in 
all,  realised  by  a  few — and  by  as  much  as  our  poor, 
sad  race  is  led  and  lifted  into  that  life  of  invincible 
goodwill,  it  will  attain  to  enduring  unity  and  peace. 
God  is  the  sky  embracing  all  spirits,  and  the  solidarity 
of  mankind  can  be  realised,  as  Tolstoy  said,  only  as 
we  discover  our  true  kinship  in  fellowship  with  Him. 
If  this  seems  vague  at  first,  we  have  only  to  ponder  it 
in  face  of  the  facts  about  us,  and  within  us,  to  learn 
that,  after  all,  it  is  the  supremely  practical  reality. 

There  are  influences  in  the  world,  of  which  the 
Cross  is  the  changeless  symbol,  mightier  than  armies, 
vaster  in  their  sweep,  and  more  irresistible  than  the 
ruffian  forces  that  destroy.  There  are  things  that 
cannot  be  shaken,  though  empires  fall  and  cultures 
crumble;  and  at  last,  if  not  by  wisdom,  then  by 
tragedy,  mankind  will  learn  where  lie  the  holy  foun- 


HOLDING  THE  WORLD  TOGETHER      63 

dations  upon  which  It  may  build  its  habitations  of 
comradeship,  its  palace  of  justice,  and  its  temple  of 
vision  and  adoration.  Thinking  men  see  now  more 
clearly  than  ever  before  that  if  the  Spirit  of  Jesus, 
His  truth,  His  laws,  are  not  the  leading  principles  of 
society,  thexe  is  no  civilisation  to  be  relied  upon. 
For,  whatever  theories  men  may  hold  as  to  the  nature 
of  Christ,  they  agree  that  the  Divine  Spirit  of  Him 
is  our  only  hope.  Without  the  spirit  of  His  life  all 
our  plans  go  awry,  all  our  hopes  are  doomed  to  de- 
feat, all  our  dreams  will  fade.  The  Divine  unites, 
the  devilish  divides;  and  only  as  men  yield  their 
hearts  to  the  Spirit  of  Jesus  are  they  drawn  together 
into  a  union  of  those  who  love  in  the  service  of  those 
who  need. 

No  doubt  such  talk  seems  dreamy  and  far-off  at  a 
time  when  force  rules  and  little  can  be  heard  save 
the  thunder  of  great  guns ;  but  that  is  because  we  do 
not  believe  the  faith  we  profess.  Nevertheless,  the 
hell  in  which  we  live  is  opening  our  eyes  to  many 
things  obscure  and  neglected  hitherto.  Four  years 
ago  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  may  have  seemed 
quixotic;  but  to-day  it  reads  like  the  Magna  Charta 
of  civihsation.  Even  yet  there  are  those  who  ridi- 
cule Ruskin  as  one  who  wrote  a  political  economy 
for  the  angels — the  implication  being,  it  would  seem, 
that  what  we  need  is  a  political  economy  for  devils. 
Verily,  verily,  we  have  our  reward!  Ruskin  was 
indeed  an  angel-minded  man,  and  for  that  very  rea- 
son he  has  much  to  say  to  us  to-day,  the  more  so 
because  we  are  more  willing  to  listen  to  his  golden 


64?  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

voice.    Hear  now  these  words  that  have  in  them  the 
fire  of  the  prophet: 

"The  form  which  the  infidelity  of  England,  especially, 
— albeit  he  might  have  said  the  same  of  America,  if  not 
worse — "has  taken,  is  one  hitherto  unheard  of  in  human 
history.  No  nation  ever  before  declared  boldly,  by  print 
and  word  of  mouth,  that  its  religion  was  good  for  show,  but 
'would  not  work.'  Over  and  over  again  it  has  happened 
that  nations  have  denied  their  gods,  but  they  denied  them 
bravely.  .  .  .  But  we  English  have  put  the  matter  in  an 
entirely  new  light.  'There  is  a  Supreme  Ruler,'  we  say, 
'no  question  of  it,  only  He  cannot  rule.  His  orders  won't 
work.  He  will  be  quite  satisfied  with  euphonious  and  re- 
spectful repetition  of  them.  Execution  would  be  too  dan- 
gerous under  existing  circumstances,  which  He  certainly 
never  contemplated.'  I  had  no  conception  of  the  absolute 
darkness  which  has  covered  the  national  mind  in  this  respect 
until  I  began  to  come  into  collision  with  persons  engaged 
in  the  study  of  economical  and  political  questions.  The  en- 
tire naivete  and  undisturbed  imbecility  with  which  I  found 
them  declare  that  the  laws  of  the  Devil  were  the  only  prac- 
tical ones  and  the  laws  of  God  were  merely  a  form  of  po- 
etical language  passed  all  that  I  had  ever  before  heard  or 
read  of  mortal  infidelity.  I  knew  the  fool  had  often  said 
in  his  heart  there  is  no  God,  but  to  hear  him  say  clearly 
out  with  his  lips,  'There  is  a  foolish  God,'  was  something 
which  my  art  studies  had  not  prepared  me  for." 

Yes,  it  is  practical  atheism — that  is  what  it  actually 
amounts  to  when  we  see  it  for  what  it  is.  When  we 
really  dare  to  believe  our  own  religion,  and  not 
merely  profess  and  sing  about  it — that  is,  when  we 


HOLDING  THE  WORLD  TOGETHER   65 

lay  it  to  heart  and  act  upon  it — our  problems  will  be 
solved.  All  of  which,  as  you  must  feel,  has  a  very 
personal  meaning  for  each  of  us,  lest  our  little  lives 
go  to  pieces.  Let  a  man  look  into  his  own  heart 
clearly,  honestly,  unflinchingly,  and  he  will  find  the 
cause  and  the  remedy  for  the  woes  of  the  world. 
What  promotes  discord  in  our  own  hearts  is  writ 
large  in  the  strife  of  humanity.  By  the  same  token, 
if  we  seek  that  which  holds  own  own  life  together  we 
have  found  the  secret,  for  society  is  only  two  or 
more  or  many  people  like  ourselves  trying  to  live 
together  in  the  world  at  the  same  time.  What  do  we 
find  when  we  look  within,  seeking  the  deepest  fact 
hidden  in  this  strange  human  heart? 

There  we  discover  a  law  of  love,  and  the  immut- 
able duty  of  obedience  to  that  law  as  the  only  way 
to  the  blessed  life.  Such  joy  as  we  know  on  this 
earth,  as  each  of  us  can  testify,  comes  of  obedience 
to  that  sovereignty  whose  authority  we  cannot  doubt 
and  whose  appeal  we  cannot  hush.  Not  one  of  us 
but  has  learned  that  selfish  living  is  an  agonising, 
fragmentary  life,  fretful,  futile,  weary,  utterly  miser- 
able. Not  one  of  us  but  knows  this  as  we  know  that 
fire  burns.  Therefore,  the  day  of  all  days,  the  great, 
great  day  of  the  feast  of  life,  is  when  we  yield  our- 
selves to  the  sway  of  a  power,  a  passion,  or  a  Person 
who  reconciles  and  adjudicates  among  our  warring 
motives,  and  shifts  the  centre  of  life  from  self  to 
God.  Then  we  discover  that  Christ  is  actually  the 
redeemer  of  man,  in  whose  spirit  we  find  both  con- 
centration of  self  and  escape  from  self — in  a  word, 


66  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

salvation.  This  is  what  the  old-time  evangelists 
meant  when  they  called  us  to  "come  to  Christ,"  and 
they  were  right — only  we  may  state  it  in  other  terms. 
Let  a  man  dare  to  trust  and  obey  what  he  Icnows 
to  be  highest,  truest,  and  most  loyal,  let  him  follow 
it  faithfully  and  without  fear,  and  he  will  actually 
come  to  Christ.  Not  only  so,  but  Christ  will  come  to 
him,  and  he  will  become  aware  of  a  fellowship  dearer 
than  life  itself,  and  know  the  company  of  a  Friend 
whose  rebuke  is  more  to  be  prized  than  the  smile  of 
the  world.  Nothing  is  more  simple,  more  natural, 
or  nearer  the  heart  to  do.  No  matter  what  blunders 
we  may  have  made,  how  far  we  have  fallen,  or  what 
a  load  of  misery  we  may  be  staggering  under  the  way 
is  always  open  into  this  true  life,  this  real  life,  and 
that  way  is  the  Christ-way.  Living  in  this  wild  and 
desperate  age,  when  so  many  ties  are  torn  apart  and 
so  many  hearts  broken,  let  us  give  ourselves  to  Him 
of  whom  the  Apostle  said:  "In  whom  we  have  re- 
demption, even  the  forgiveness  of  sins;  who  is  the 
image  of  the  invisible  God:  for  by  Him  were  all 
things  created  that  are  in  heaven,  and  that  are  in 
the  earth,  visible  and  invisible,  whether  they  be 
thrones,  or  dominions,  or  powers;  all  things  were 
made  by  Him,  and  for  Him;  and  He  is  before  all 
things,  and  by  Him  all  things  hold  together." 


THE  INTERPRETER 

"Which  being  interpreted." — Matt.  i.  23. 

SOME  of  US  who  are  no  longer  young,  can  recall 
a  time  when  It  was  deemed  a  sin  a  read  a  novel, 
on  the  ground  that  a  story  that  Is  not  a  fact  must  be 
a  falsehood.  An  exception  was  made,  however,  in 
the  case  of  Bunyan's  Pilgrim's  Progress,  because  It 
was  a  religious  book,  and  that  took  the  curse  off. 
Sir  Walter  Scott  would  seem  to  be  the  next  one  ad- 
mitted to  this  exemption.  To  one  who  grew  up  in 
the  sweet  air  of  piety,  when  the  adventures  of  the 
soul  were  the  topics  of  fireside  talk,  that  great  alle- 
gory was  a  book  of  absorbing  charm;  alike  for  Its 
Saxon  style  and  for  its  drama  of  the  inner  life.  Alas, 
it  Is  almost  unintelligible  in  our  day.  Owing  to  our 
reticence  in  regard  to  the  deep  things  of  the  soul,  a 
boy  of  to-day  finds  that  story  unreal  and  remote. 

Who  can  forget  the  day  when  Christian,  on  his 
way  from  the  City  of  Destruction,  came  to  the  house 
of  the  Interpreter.  On  being  admitted,  he  was  led 
from  room  to  room,  and  saw  things  strange  and  hard 
to  understand.  First  a  room  where  was  a  picture  of 
one  whom  he  did  not  know,  then  a  room  so  dusty 
that  he  was  well-nigh  choked  when  it  was  swept,  and 
another  room  where  he  saw  two  lads.  Patience  and 
Passion.     The  unquenchable  fire  fed  by  a  hidden 

67 


68  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

oil,  the  fight  at  the  gate  of  the  Palace  Beautiful^ 
the  man  In  the  Cage  of  Despair — who  can  forget  such 
chambers  of  imagery  and  the  interpretation  thereof? 
Truly  it  was  a  great  dream,  and  one  knows  not  which 
to  admire  most,  its  insight  or  its  art.  It  painted  the 
story  of  the  eternal  adventure  of  the  soul,  its  starts, 
its  stops,  its  bafflements,  its  besetments,  as  it  pursues 
its  heroic  and  shadow-haunted  way. 

After  all,  what  is  this  strange  world  in  which  we 
live  but  a  house  of  wonder?  and  happy  is  he  who 
finds  the  great  Interpreter.  Each  year,  each  period 
of  life,  is  a  room  full  of  mystery,  and  we  need  some 
one  to  explain  what  we  see  but  cannot  understand. 
If  Time  is  a  great  teacher,  as  evermore  the  present 
interprets  the  past  to  the  future,  his  process  is  slow 
and  often  painful.  Our  parents,  our  teachers,  are  so 
many  interpreters,  yet  much  remains  hidden.  As 
Carlyle  would  say,  it  is  like  reading  a  "hieroglyphical 
and  prophetic  book  the  lexicon  of  which  lies  in  eter- 
nity." As  Salnte  Beuve  said.  It  makes  little  difference 
whether  one  opens  at  page  120,  which  is  the  integral 
calculus,  or  page  85,  which  is  hearing  the  band  play 
In  the  garden.  Always  we  have  to  turn  back  and 
recover  the  context,  and  even  then  we  can  read  only 
here  a  line  and  there  a  stanza.  Yet  some  things  are 
clear,  and  by  the  aid  of  the  great  Interpreters  we  can 
make  our  way  towards  home. 

Back  across  the  years  comes  the  memory  of  a  great 
teacher,  beloved  In  England  as  well  as  In  America, 
who  discoursed  so  eloquently  on  "the  will  to  inter- 
pret" as  the  secret  of  knowledge.    He  was  not  satis- 


THE  INTERPRETER  69 

fied  with  the  old  dual  process  of  concept  and  precept 
— conception  being  a  banknote,  a  promise  to  pay, 
which  is  cashed  on  perception.  No,  "man  is  a  being 
that  interprets,"  he  said,  and  the  process  of  knowl- 
edge is  triadic,  always  involving  a  third  element.  A 
concept  may  be  a  "leading"  toward  the  truth,  as 
James  would  say,  and  a  precept  may  disclose  a  fact, 
a  law,  a  principle.  But  if  we  are  to  know  meanings, 
values,  especially  any  ideal  values,  we  must  survey 
from  above  and  interpret.  Thus,  as  Josiah  Royce 
held,  knowledge,  like  life,  may  be  a  colloquy  or  a 
prayer,  but  it  is  essentially  social,  and  to  know  at  all 
is  to  know  socially.  Humanity  is  a  community  of 
interpretation;  we  look  at  nature  through  the  eyes  of 
a  social  world.  Moreover,  in  the  simplest  knowl- 
edge, did  we  but  realise  it,  another  Mind  enters  as  an 
integral  part,  as  on  the  way  to  Emmaus  the  pilgrims 
were  joined  by  One  who  interpreted  to  them  the 
meaning  of  words  long  dim.  So  much  for  the  insight 
of  Royce,  as  he  expounded  his  gospel  of  "The  Be- 
loved Community,"  in  which  we  are  joined  in  a  fel- 
lowship of  the  truth. 

Another  favourite  figure  with  Royce  was  that  we 
are  like  travellers  crossing  a  boundary  into  an  alien 
country,  and  must  have  a  care  about  the  value  of  our 
money.  On  one  side  of  the  line  our  coins  and  notes 
are  valid,  on  the  other  it  is  different.  There  another 
language  is  spoken,  and  there  another  system  of  val- 
ues obtains.  Just  so,  during  recent  years  the  mind  of 
man  has  passed  a  boundary  into  another  world  of 
thought  and  outlook — a  vast  country  hardly  dreamed 


70  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

of  before — and  we  need  the  aid  of  the  Interpreter. 
We  walk  to-day  where  no  path  is,  where  strange 
and  terrible  shapes  confront  us.  If  the  allegory  of 
Bunyan  seems  far  off  and  unreal  to  men  to-day,  the 
fact  is  but  a  token  of  the  change  which  has  passed 
over  the  world.  The  dream  is  still  true :  it  is  the  old 
eternal  Dream  of  Humanity,  which  all  the  mighty 
seers  have  interpreted,  each  in  his  own  tongue.  But 
it  must  be  interpreted  in  the  terms  of  to-day.  Here 
is  the  mission  of  the  Church.  It  must  be  a  Com- 
munity of  Interpretation,  and  its  pulpit  the  place 
where  a  seer-like  soul  answers  the  unasked  questions 
of  the  human  heart.  Twenty  years  ago  John  Bur- 
roughs wrote : 

"The  religious  sceptics  to-day  are  a  very  large  class,  and 
they  are  among  the  most  hopeful,  intelligent,  patriotic,  and 
upright  of  our  citizens.  Let  us  see:  probably  four-fifths  of 
the  literary  men  of  this  country  and  Great  Britain ;  a  large 
proportion  of  journalists  and  editors ;  half  the  lawyers ;  more 
than  half  the  doctors;  a  large  per  cent,  of  the  teachers,  and 
a  larger  per  cent,  of  the  business  men.  They  find  the  creeds 
in  which  they  were  nurtured  no  longer  credible." 

No  longer  intelligible,  he  might  have  added  with 
equal  truth;  and  if  that  was  true  twenty  years  ago, 
it  is  twenty  times  truer  to-day.  Time  was  when  the 
task  of  the  Church  was  to  win  bad  men;  now  its  task 
is  to  retain  the  good  ones.  Once  the  Church  sup- 
ported men,  upheld  the  weary  and  sorrow-bound; 
now  men  are  besought  to  support  the  Church.  Why 
is  this  so  ?    Who  are  the  men  who  hold  aloof  from 


THE  INTERPRETER  71 

the  Church?  Not  simply  the  low  and  evil-minded, 
but  many  of  the  lofty  of  soul,  the  upright  of  char- 
acter, who  have  the  future  in  their  hearts,  and  whose 
service  to  humanity  puts  many  a  Churchman  to 
shame.  Lincoln  was  of  this  class  in  his  day,  and  Bur- 
roughs names  the  late  Goldwin  Smith  as  an  example 
in  our  day.  They  are  not  irreligious.  If  not  devo- 
tional, they  are  truly  devoted.  If  they  make  no  pro- 
fession, they  are  most  fruitful  in  performance.  Men 
of  science,  men  of  letters,  men  of  affairs,  men  aglow 
with  social  idealism  and  effort  stand  apart  from  the 
Church.  They  seem  not  to  need  it,  not  to  be  helped 
by  it.  When  asked  why,  they  say  that  casting  their 
lot  with  the  Church  implies  the  acceptance  of  dogmas 
in  which  they  cannot  honestly  believe.  Perhaps  it  is 
true,  and  one  re.spects  their  attitude;  but  one  also 
recalls  the  words  of  Drummond: 

"There  are  earnest  and  gifted  lives  to-day  whose  lips  at 
least  will  not  name  the  name  of  Christ.  I  speak  of  them 
with  respect ;  their  shoe-latchets  many  of  us  are  not  worthy 
to  unloose.  But,  because  the  creed  of  the  neighbouring  mis- 
sion hall  is  a  travesty  of  religion,  they  refuse  to  acknow^ledge 
the  power  of  the  living  Christ.  Oh,  the  narrowness  of  such 
breadth !" 

What,  then,  shall  we  do?  Throw  the  historic 
dogmas  of  the  Church  out  the  window  and  over  the 
wall,  and  devote  ourselves  to  the  gospel  of  "sweet- 
ness and  light"  ?  Such  a  method  has  often  been  tried, 
and  as  often  failed.  No  mere  confection  of  rose- 
water  sentiment  and  intellectual  beauty  will  satisfy 


72  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

the  deep  cravings  of  our  nature  and  the  needs  that 
gnaw  at  our  hearts.  Something  profounder  is  needed 
if  it  is  to  reach  the  human  soul  and  heal  the  infinite 
pain  that  throbs  in  it  for  ever.  From  a  religion 
of  sweetness  and  light  men  will  turn,  in  their  dire 
perplexities,  to  the  crassest  superstition,  to  the  crudest 
dogma,  accepting  wonders  which  the  intellect  rejects 
for  the  solace  which  the  intellect  cannot  give.  No, 
it  is  all  a  matter  of  interpretation.  Dogma,  said 
Phillips  Brooks,  is  "Truth  packed  for  transporta- 
tion," and  it  is  of  little  use  along  the  way.  It  must 
be  unpacked  and  the  living  insight  that  gave  it  birth 
and  made  it  worth  packing  brought  into  the  light. 
No  dogma  was  invented.  Every  doctrine  of  the 
Church  was  an  effort  to  utter  and  interpret  a  deep 
and  vital  reality  of  experience.  Its  terms  may  be 
obsolete,  but  the  truth  remains,  and  our  duty  is  to 
find  the  truth  it  was  trying  to  tell  and  interpret  that 
truth  to-day. 

Once  on  a  time  it  was  thought  that  men  must  get 
religion,  as  if  it  were  a  prize  to  be  captured.  Now 
we  see  that  men  have  religion,  and  that  it  needs  to 
be  discovered,  developed,  and  interpreted.  Religion 
is  not  a  rare  exotic,  a  talisman,  to  be  sought  far  and 
near.  It  is  nigh  to  man,  even  to  his  heart,  as  he 
himself  will  discover  when  that  chamber  of  half-light 
and  mystery  is  interpreted  to  him.  This  haunting 
hope,  this  dumb  aspiration  of  the  race  finds  voice 
in  the  great  prophets,  and  that  is  the  secret  of  their 
power  over  their  fellows.  They  reveal  men  to  them- 
selves, make  clear  what  is  vague  in  their  minds,  and 


THE  INTERPRETER  73 

"Utter  their  stammering  prayer;  they  are  interpreters. 
Every  religious  movement  shows  that  the  leader  and 
the  led  are  swept  along  by  the  same  tide,  and  that 
the  one  speaks  for  the  many  as  well  as  to  them, 
uttering  the  wish,  the  want  that  wells  up  in  every 
heart,  but  which  so  few  can  express.  Never  were 
such  voices  needed  more  than  to-day.  Men  are  as 
religious  as  ever  they  were  in  days  agone,  but  the 
old  forms  do  not  utter  it,  much  less  interpret  it. 
Who  does  not  feel  this  need  in  his  own  heart  and 
the  pathos  of  it  in  others? 

We  worship  in  the  afterglow  of  the  festival  of 
Pentecost.  The  contrast  must  have  been  in  many 
minds  between  the  Tower  of  Babel,  with  its  con- 
fusion of  voices,  its  babbling,  its  heaven-storming  as- 
piration; and  Pentecost,  with  its  one  voice  speaking 
the  everlasting  truth  so  that  each  man  heard  it  in  his 
own  tongue.  Brought  together.  Babel  and  Pentecost 
are  a  parable  of  our  day.  For  a  century  and  longer 
we  have  been  trying  to  build  to  the  heavens  a  mighty 
tower — the  civilisation  of  which  we  boasted  in  loud- 
sounding  words,  achievement  after  achievement  of 
science,  in  which  we  gloried.  Suddenly  there  was  a 
confusion  of  tongues,  and  a  shadow  fell  over  it  all, 
and  such  unintelligible  babblings  as  we  have  to-day! 
When  the  Church  becomes  of  one  mind  in  one  place 
and  of  one  accord,  like  the  disciples  of  old,  who  met 
together  in  the  upper  room,  the  confusion  of  Babel 
will  be  answered  by  the  eternal  harmony  spoken  by 
tongues  of  flame  and  power  and  light. 

How  often,  in  these  dark  days,  when  one  picks  up 


74  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

a  book  there  is  a  note  in  which  the  publisher  tells 
us  that  the  author  "was  killed  in  action  on  the  West- 
ern Front"  on  such  a  day  and  date.  With  infinite 
regret  we  read  such  a  note  in  the  last  edition  of 
A  Student  in  Arms,  by  Donald  Hankey,  one  of  the 
rarest  books  that  has  grown  on  the  red  field  of  the 
war.  Early  in  his  ministry  Hankey  saw  that  the 
Church  does  not  understand  men,  and  that  men  do 
not  understand  the  Church.  An  impalpable,  if  not 
impassable,  barrier  seemed  to  divide  the  two,  which 
Hankey  set  himself  to  penetrate.  For  that  purpose 
he  laid  aside  his  books  and  went  among  men,  living 
with  them  in  the  dim  and  hum  and  litter  of  their 
labour,  the  better  to  know  the  lives  they  live,  that 
so  he  might  tell  them  of  "The  Lord  of  all  Good 
Life";  a  book  in  which  he  portrayed  the  failure  of 
the  Church  and  the  power  of  Christ.  Love  of  coun- 
try, love  of  men,  led  him  to  the  front  as  a  soldier 
in  the  ranks,  and  his  last  book  was  made  up  of  essays 
written  in  the  trenches,  which  for  directness  of  in- 
sight and  vividness  of  style  have  very  few  like  them. 

Every  one  of  those  essays  is  significant,  but  the 
most  pertinent  to  my  purpose  is  the  one  entitled  "The 
Religion  of  the  Inarticulate,"  having  to  do  with  the 
work  of  the  chaplains  in  the  army.  Hankey  found 
the  chaplains  chiding  the  men  because  they  did  not 
say  their  prayers,  did  not  come  to  Communion,  and 
for  not  being  afraid  to  die  without  making  their 
peace  with  God.  Yet  there  were  the  men  ready  any 
moment  to  pay  "the  full  measure  of  devotion"  for  an 
ideal,  a  principle;  ready  to  make  the  final  sacrifice 


THE  INTERPRETER  75 

that  justice,  mercy,  and  liberty  should  not  perish 
from  the  earth.  The  chaplains  saw  nothing  relig- 
ious in  that  readiness  to  die  for  the  right.  Nor  did 
the  men.  They  had  deep-seated  beliefs  in  goodness, 
in  right,  in  justice,  in  service,  but  they  did  not  connect 
these  beliefs  with  religion,  much  less  with  the  rites 
to  which  the  chaplains  asked  them  to  conform.  They 
thought  that  religion  was  something  else — believing 
in  the  Bible  and  setting  up  to  be  better  than  their 
neighbours,  and  by  believing  in  the  Bible  they  meant 
^'believing  that  Jonah  was  swallowed  by  the  whale." 
Surely,  said  Hankey,  this  is  nothing  short  of  tragedy; 
and  he  was  right. 

What  is  the  remedy  for  this  tragic  misunderstand- 
ing, this  failure  to  connect  unselfishness,  charity,  gen- 
erosity, and  courage  with  religion?  Again,  it  is  a 
matter  of  interpretation.  Long  ago  Tertullian  said 
that  "the  human  soul  is  naturally  Christian,"  and 
that  "no  man  can  understand  Christianity  and  reject 
it."  While  this  may  not  be  the  whole  truth,  it  has 
much  in  it  that  is  eternally  true.  If,  therefore,  men 
reject  Christianity,  ignore  it,  or  do  not  even  recog- 
nise its  presence,  it  is  because  it  has  not  been  inter- 
preted to  them  aright.  Else  they  would  not  think 
of  it  as  something  remote  from  actual  life,  artificial 
and  unreal;  would  not  identify  it  with  the  formalism 
and  smug  self-righteousness  which  Jesus  spent  His 
life  in  trying  to  destroy.  One  reason  for  this  failure 
of  interpretation,  as  Hankey  saw,  is  that  ministers 
know  so  little  of  men,  live  hke  "a  third  race"  apart 
from  the  thick  of  things,  and  so  cannot  interpret  men 


76  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

to  themselves  and  link  the  Christ-life  of  humanity 
with  the  life  of  Christ.  Hampered  by  forms,  blinded 
by  dogmas,  fettered  by  customs,  they  are  unable  to 
come  close  to  the  men  whom  they  seek,  sincerely  and 
earnestly,  to  help.    The  author  adds  these  words: 

"It  is  certainly  arguable  that  we  educated  Christians  are 
in  our  own  way  almost  as  inarticulate  as  the  uneducated 
whom  we  always  want  to  instruct.  In  the  hour  of  danger 
and  wounds  and  death  many  a  man  has  realised  with  a  shock 
that  the  articles  of  his  creed  about  which  he  was  most  con- 
tentious mattered  very,  very  little,  and  that  he  had  some- 
what overlooked  the  articles  that  proved  to  be  vital.  If  the 
working  man's  religion  is  often  v^holly  inarticulate,  the  real 
religion  of  the  educated  man  is  often  quite  wrongly  ar- 
ticulated." 

Evermore  our  humanity,  like  Pharoah,  is  visited 
by  a  mighty  dream  of  things  eternal,  and  is  troubled 
by  it.  Soothsayers  and  wise  men  read  its  meaning 
according  to  their  interest  or  ignorance,  guessing 
at  its  omens.  The  need  is  for  the  Interpreter,  and 
the  One  who  has  most  clearly  and  truly  set  forth 
the  meaning  of  our  dream  is  Christ.  With  what 
sure  insight  and  revealing  sympathy  He  shows  us 
that  His  gospel  is  the  explanation  and  the  justifica- 
tion and  the  triumph  of  all  that  we  do  now  believe 
in,  hope  for,  and  long  to  be.  He  begins  by  making 
our  religion  articulate  in  words  so  simple,  so  living, 
so  vivid  that  our  own  souls  seem  to  speak  to  us  in 
His  tones,  the  while  we  marvel  at  the  wonder  and 
surprise   of   His   truth.      Like   some   old   ineffable 


THE  INTERPRETER  77 

melody,  His  words  seem  to  know  what  Is  in  our 
hearts,  the  way  we  have  come,  and  whither  we  seek 
to  go.  What  joy  is  like  having  some  one  who  knows 
us,  understands  us,  loves  us,  redeems  us.  Truly  His 
name  shall  be  called  Emmanuel,  which,  being  inter- 
preted, is  God  with  us,  God  within  us. 


OUR  FATHER 

"After   this   manner    therefore    pray   ye:   Our    Father   who 
art  in  heaven." — Matt.  vi.  9. 

NEVER  upon  this  earth  have  human  ears  heard 
words  more  moving  than  the  opening  line  of 
the  prayer  which  the  Master  taught  us  to  pray.  No 
more  pathetic  cry  has  ever  ascended  from  the 
shadowed  earth  to  the  shadowless  heavens.  Alas! 
our  familiarity  with  the  words  hides  from  us  their 
fathomless  depth,  their  immeasurable  height,  their 
infinite  sweep  of  meaning  and  promise.  Sky-Father 
was  almost  the  first  name  which  man  gave  to  the 
vast  Power  upon  which  he  felt  himself  dependent, 
and  even  Jesus  could  not  find  a  deeper,  sweeter,  truer 
name.  If  you  would  feel  the  force  of  that  name 
and  how  far  its  echoes  reach,  go  out  some  night  under 
a  clear  sky  of  stars,  and,  looking  up  into  that  depth, 
repeat  the  words,  "Our  Father  who  art  in  Heaven!" 
Some  one  has  said  that  there  are  three  stages  in 
the  growth  and  unfolding  of  a  human  soul.  The 
first  is  when  it  wakes  up  from  that  strange  "sleep 
and  forgetting"  which  men  call  birth,  and  looks  with 
the  wide  and  startled  eyes  of  infancy  upon  the  big, 
buzzing  world  about  it.  The  next  stage  is  when  the 
soul  becomes  conscious  of  itself  as  a  distinct  person, 
separate  from  others,  with  a  life  and  duties  of  its 

78 


OUR  FATHER  79 

own.  The  third  stage  is  when  it  becomes  aware  of 
God  as  the  One  with  whom  it  really  has  to  do  in  the 
adventure  of  life.  But  we  may  add  a  fourth  stage, 
equally  important  as  marking  an  epoch  in  the  history 
of  the  soul:  and  that  is  when  it  passes,  slowly  or 
with  sunburst  joy,  from  the  idea  of  God  as  a  Power, 
a  Ruler,  to  the  sense  of  God  as  Father!  Surely  that 
is  the  supreme  moment  in  the  history  of  any  soul, 
its  real  birthday,  the  date  of  a  new  life.  Happy  is 
the  man  who  has  advanced  from  the  partialism  of  a 
Sovereign  to  the  universal  saving  grace  of  a  Father 
— then  is  he  free  indeed! 

Ruskin  was  right  when  he  said  that  the  world  is 
an  orphanage  so  long  as  men  do  not  know  God 
their  Father,  and  all  wisdom  and  knowledge  are 
mere  bewildered  darkness  if  they  do  not  teach  us  to 
love  Him.  All  religion,  all  philosophy,  are  enshrined 
in  that  one  word.  Father,  in  which  the  most  in- 
effable truths  are  blended  with  old  and  simple  and 
lovable  things.  The  use  which  Jesus  made  of  the 
deep  and  sweet  word  Father,  unveils  the  secret  of 
His  life,  His  faith.  His  serenity.  His  incredible 
courage,  and  His  undefeatable  hope.  With  what 
unerring  insight  He  took  the  ideas  of  causation, 
intelligence,  force,  righteousness,  and  the  other  frag- 
ments which  men  had  found,  and  touched  them  with 
the  light  and  glory  and  tenderness  of  His  vision 
of  God  the  Father !  Everywhere  He  saw  the  pres- 
ence of  God  who  clothes  the  grass,  weaves  robes 
for  the  lily,  and  stretches  out  His  hand  when  the 
sparrow  falls.     Indeed,  the  life  of  Jesus,  His  words 


80  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

and  works,  seemed  to  have  one  deep  passion,  one 
ruling  purpose,  and  that  was  to  reveal  God  the 
Father  as  the  sovereign  reality  and  the  solution  of 
all  the  problems  of  life  and  death. 

No  one  knew  better  than  Jesus  how  full  our  human 
life  is  of  intellectual  and  moral  difficulties  set  as  we 
are  to  follow  the  good  in  a  world  often  rough  and 
always  baffling.  He  saw  clearly.  He  felt  keenly,  and 
He  knew  that  the  secret  lies  in  laying  hold  of  a  truth 
great  enough  to  include  little  truths  and  half-truths, 
lifting  them  into  harmony.  As  in  the  Iliad  of  Homer 
-all  is  confused  and  confusing,  until  we  find  the  reason 
for  those  marching  armies,  so  life  is  bewildering  until 
we  find  the  Master  Key;  and  Jesus  found  it  in  God 
the  Father.  Men  came  to  Him  with  every  kind  of 
question,  idle  questions,  curious  questions,  old  mooted 
questions,  and  also  those  bitter,  poignant  questions 
which  shake  the  heart  and  break  it.  Not  often  did  He 
answer  the  questions  put  to  Him,  but  instead  He 
sought  to  put  into  the  hearts  of  men  the  key  to  all 
questions:  "Our  Father."  God  is  near,  God  knows, 
God  helps — such  was  His  key  to  all  the  riddles  of 
mortal  life  and  immortal  destiny.  Here,  for  once, 
common  sense  of  a  most  uncommon  kind  found  its 
fruition  in  a  faith  as  simple  as  the  trust  of  a  little 
child. 

What  was  the  basis  of  this  faith?  From  what 
root  did  it  grow?  Here,  again,  Jesus  was  so  simple 
that  He  was  wise,  and  so  wise  that  He  was  simple. 
He  found  the  key  to  His  high  faith,  not  in  the  sky 
above,  but  in  the  heart  of  man,  in  the  creative,  self- 


OUR  FATHER  81 

giving,  unwearying,  death-defying  father-mother 
heart.  His  fundamental  insight  was  that  the  high- 
est and  holiest  in  man  reveals  what  is  more  real  in 
God,  and  since  love  is  the  noblest  thing  in  man,  it  is 
also  the  noblest  thing  in  God.  Every  truth,  every 
duty,  every  joy,  every  hope  of  His  gospel  rests 
upon  the  sure  foundation  of  this  kinship  of  man  and 
God,  and  is  thus  a  truth  that  can  be  tested  by  each  of 
us  in  his  own  life.  His  secret  is  thus  so  simple  that 
men  have  overlooked  it,  and  so  near  by  that  they  have 
stepped  over  it.  From  the  perversions  of  sense  and 
the  pollutions  of  sin  Jesus  appealed  to  the  highest 
within  us,  telling  us  to  obey  it,  trust  it,  follow  it.  He 
dared  to  make  trial  of  this  high  and  simple  secret, 
and  it  is,  therefore,  that  He  is  our  Leader,  our  Re- 
deemer. 

What  plummet  is  long  enough  to  fathom  the 
father-mother  heart?  When  William  Black,  the 
novelist,  was  about  to  sail  from  New  York  to  Eng- 
land a  man  rushed  on  board  with  a  basket  of  flowers 
in  his  hand.  He  came  up  to  Black  and  told  him  how, 
on  his  last  voyage,  his  little  girl  had  died  and  had 
been  buried  at  sea.  He  asked  the  novelist  if  he 
would  be  so  kind  as  to  take  the  flowers  and  scatter 
them  upon  the  waves  when  he  passed  over  a  certain 
latitude.  Of  course  Black  promised  to  do  so,  and 
very  early  one  morning,  when  it  was  still  dark,  he 
stood  on  deck  under  the  morning  stars  and  cast  the 
faded  flowers  upon  the  vast  and  wandering  grave 
of  a  little  girl.  That  was  fatherhood  reaching  forth 
after  the  loved  and  lost  in  the  darkness.     The  first 


82  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

child  of  James  Martineau  died  in  infancy  and  was 
buried  in  the  French  cemetery  in  Dublin.  Years 
went  by,  and  all  save  the  father  and  mother  forgot 
that  the  little  one  had  ever  lived.  Other  years  passed, 
and  the  mother  died,  leaving  the  father  to  walk 
alone.  At  the  age  of  eighty-seven  he  attended  the 
tercentenary  of  the  Dublin  University,  and  one  day 
the  lonely  old  man  stole  away  from  a  brilliant  func- 
tion to  stand  once  more  beside  the  grave  of  his  first- 
born. No  other  living  soul  recalled  that  little  face 
long  since  fallen  into  dust,  but  the  father  did  not 
forget. 

Such  is  the  deep  and  tender  reality  In  the  heart 
of  man  upon  which  Jesus  rested  His  faith,  finding 
in  it  a  revelation  of  God.  Hence  His  words  remind- 
ing us  that  if  we,  being  evil  and  imperfect,  know 
how  to  love  our  litle  ones,  "how  much  more  will 
your  Father  in  heaven!"  Truly  there  is  something 
awful  in  the  simplicity  of  His  insight,  as  there  is 
something  ineffable  in  its  disclosure.  Nor  is  this  love 
that  unveils  God  a  soft,  yielding  sentiment  in  which 
evil  evaporates  and  law  melts  away.  Far  from  it. 
It  has  its  sterner  aspect,  its  terrible  austerity.  Sin 
is  never  seen  for  what  it  really  is  until  we  see  that  it 
is  not  a  rebellion  against  a  ruler,  but  a  blow  at  the 
face  of  a  Father!  It  is  the  vision  of  the  love  of  God 
that  deepens  sin,  while  giving  the  only  hope  of  re- 
demption from  it.  Even  the  harshness  of  love  has  in 
it  a  touch  of  yearning  pity.  Patmore  has  a  little  poem 
in  which  he  tells  how  a  father  punished  his  little  son 
and  put  him  to  bed,  "his  mother,  who  was  patient. 


OUR  FATHER  83 

being  dead."  Sore  of  heart  himself,  he  went  to  see 
the  child,  and  found  him  asleep  with  his  toys  beside 
him  to  comfort  him. 

"So  when  that  night  I  prayed 
To  God,  I  wept,  and  said: 
Ah!  when  at  last  we  lie  with  tranced  breath, 
Not  vexing  Thee  in  death, 
And  Thou  rememberest  of  what  toys 
We  made  our  joys, 
How  weakly  understood 
Thy  great  commanded  good — 
Then,  Fatherly  not  less 

Than  I,  whom  Thou  hast  moulded  from  the  clay, 
Thou'lt  leave  Thy  wrath  and  say, 
I  will  be  sorry  for  their  childishness." 

How  can  we  h'old  this  high  and  tender  faith  In  the 
love  of  God  the  Father  in  such  a  world  as  this  to- 
day? Often  it  seems  like  an  exquisite  dream  spun 
on  the  loom  of  some  kind  heart,  but  too  frail  and 
fair  to  stand  in  face  of  a  world  at  war  when  woes 
are  so  many.  Pain,  poverty,  disease,  cruelty,  death, 
and  a  holocaust  of  hate  desolate  the  earth.  What  be- 
fore was  accidental  and  occasional  seems  to  have  be- 
come normal  and  universal.  How  can  the  faith  of 
Jesus  live  in  a  world  so  full  of  griefs  and  graves? 
Such  is  the  question  that  pierces  many  a  heart  to-day, 
adding  another  pain  to  the  agony  of  the  hour.  How 
keen  must  be  the  anguish  of  those  who  have  lost  those 
they  loved  and  also  their  faith  in  a  God  of  Love! 
Sorrow  does  not  always  soften.    Often  it  makes  men 


84  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

hard  and  bitter  of  heart,  secreting  an  acid  that  dis- 
solves the  pearl  of  great  price.  Many  thoughtful 
people  are  in  danger  of  this  ultimate  inner  disaster, 
but  they  must  not  rashly  let  go  of  the  highest  faith. 
Now  consider.  If  ever  any  faith  was  tested  by 
hard  facts  it  was  the  faith  of  Jesus  in  the  love  of 
God.  He  drank  the  cup  of  desolation,  draining  it  to 
its  dregs.  When  we  think  of  the  countless  young 
lives  cut  off  in  their  prime,  let  us  not  forget  that 
Jesus  died  at  the  age  of  a  little  over  thirty. 

"He  was  young 
Who  for  my  sake  in  silence  hung 
Upon  the  Cross  with  passion  wrung." 

And  such  a  muddy  death!  No  woe  that  has  be- 
fallen any  one  in  this  war  has  surpassed  that  dark 
cross  outside  the  city  gate.  Think  of  the  forces 
that  brought  about  that  tragedy!  Religious  hypoc- 
risy, political  cunning,  and  brutal  force  united  to 
defame  and  destroy  the  noblest  and  loftiest  being 
that  has  walked  the  earth.  Yet  that  lonely  Sufferer 
dying  in  the  dark,  despised  and  desecrated,  did  not 
lose  faith  in  God  the  Father.  From  the  Cross  comes 
the  final  rebuke  of  all  our  doubt,  all  our  despair: 
"Father,  into  Thy  hands  I  commend  My  spirit!" 
Surely  a  faith  so  tested  may  be  trusted  unto  the  utter- 
most in  storm  and  calm,  In  life  and  death. 

When  we  think  of  that  Sufferer  outside  the  city 
gate,  and  the  words  of  prayer  upon  His  lips,  the  text 
comes  to  us  with  a  new  meaning:  "After  this  man- 
ner pray  ye:  Our  Father."     Only  so  can  we  pray 


OUR  FATHER  85 

at  all.  Prayer  to  a  Destiny,  prayer  to  a  Hierarchy 
of  Laws,  prayer  to  an  impersonal  Force  or  Fate,  is 
impossible.  It  is  the  word  Father  that  opens  a  foun- 
tain of  prayer  in  our  hearts,  solving  the  mystery  of 
prayer,  explaining  its  philosophy,  and  justifying  its 
practice.  Then  we  know  that  our  cry  of  need  is  no 
empty  wail  blown  across  a  wintry  sky,  unheard  and 
unheeded!  No,  there  is  One  who  hears,  and  if  His 
will  Is  often  other  than  our  own,  It  Is  better  so. 
Prayer  Is  as  natural  as  the  homing  Instinct  of  a  bird, 
and  faith  in  God  the  Father  makes  it  free,  joyous, 
and  uplifting.  Those  who  walk  the  way  of  prayer 
know  that  life  Is  from  above  downward,  as  the  poet 
had  learned  who  wrote  those  lovely  lines  whose  In- 
sight Is  so  deep  and  sure : — 

"Let  me  no  more  my  comfort  draw 
From  my  frail  hold  of  Thee; 
In  this  alone  rejoice  with  awe, 
Thy  mighty  grasp  of  me." 

What  a  heavy  load  of  loneliness  faith  in  God  the 
Father  lifts  from  the  human  heart!  It  is  appalling 
when  we  remember  that,  however  rich  we  may  be 
in  friendships,  and  despite  our  most  Intimate  and 
tender  fellowships,  we  live  alone,  think  alone,  suffer 
alone,  and  die  alone.  Not  even  the  nearest  heart 
knows  half  the  reasons  why  we  smile  or  sigh.  But 
when  we  hear  the  words  "Our  Father,"  our  loneliness 
is  broken,  and  we  know  that  we  are  "never  less  alone 
than  when  alone."     What  a  relief,  what  a  joy  to 


86  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

know  that,  if  we  open  the  door,  the  One  who  loves 
us  best  will  enter  in  and  dwell  with  us,  pervade  us, 
possess  us.  No  wonder  Thomas  Erskine,  of  Lin- 
lathen,  used  to  ask  those  he  met  in  the  way,  "My 
brother !  my  sister !  do  you  know  the  Father  ?"  How 
much  we  need  to  know  Him,  and  the  secret  of  His 
inner  fellowship,  in  the  hour  of  affliction,  else  we 
may  sink  under  the  sense  that  we  are  slaves  of  Fate, 
or  whim,  tossed  to  and  fro  without  reason.  One 
can  bear  much — anything,  perhaps — if  he  knows  that 
his  sorrow  is  not  mere  ruthlessness,  a  blind  fury  walk- 
ing with  aimless  feet.  The  cup  may  be  bitter,  but  we 
know  it  is  not  poison  when  we  take  it  as  a  sacrament 
from  the  hand  of  our  Father. 

On  the  evening  on  which  he  died,  Chalmers  was 
walking  in  his  garden,  when  his  daughter  heard  him 
repeat  again  and  again  to  himself  the  words,  "My 
Father,  my  Heavenly  Father."  In  the  morning  he 
had  vanished.  Think  it  all  through  from  end  to  end, 
and  you  will  see  that  the  real  basis  of  hope  of  a 
future  life  is  in  God  the  Father!  In  this  faith  Jesus 
lived  and  died,  and,  dying,  conquered  death!  How 
many  have  followed  in  His  train,  triumphant  by  His 
grace  as  they  took  their  flight  to  His  Father  and  our 
Father.  Over  the  homes  of  our  living,  over  the  graves 
of  our  dead — ^now,  alas !  so  many  and  so  new — ^let 
us  hold  by  the  faith  of  the  prayer  the  Master  taught 
us.  In  face  of  the  dark  questions  that  tantalise  or 
terrify  us,  let  us  be  loyal  to  it.  There  is  no  higher 
faith,  and  it  must  be  wise  to  trust  the  highest  and 


OUR  FATHER  87 

give  ourselves  to  it.  At  last,  when  we  leave  this 
earthly  scene  and  take  our  way  along  the  hidden  path, 
let  us  go  bravely  with  the  great  and  simple  words  on 
our  lips,  "Our  Father  who  art  in  Heaven." 


DIVINE  GUIDANCE  IN  HUMAN  AFFAIRS 

"I  will  guide  thee  with  mine  eye." — Psalm  xxxii.  8. 

"The  very  hairs  of  your  head  are  all  numbered." — 

Matt.  x.  30. 

13ERHAPS  not  one  of  you  ever  saw  a  copy  of  the 
•*■  most  interesting  journal  in  my  country,  a  paper 
full  of  fairy  stories,  of  weird  things  that  never  come 
to  pass,  and  other  forms  of  highly  imaginative  writ- 
ing. Of  course  I  mean  the  Record  of  Congress,  the 
best  journal  of  fiction  in  the  land.  In  one  issue  it  was 
related  how,  in  the  embarrassment  of  an  early  ses- 
sion, of  which  the  worthy  chaplain  had  not  been 
advised,  the  Speaker  called  the  House  to  order  with 
this  amazing  announcement:  "The  clerk  will  please 
read  the  journal.  We  will  proceed  without  Divine 
guidance,"  No  protest  was  offered,  no  word  was 
uttered,  and  all  seemed  willing  to  proceed  without 
that  guiding  wisdom  which  cometh  down  from 
above. 

After  all  how  is  the  wisest  Solon  of  them  all  to 
know  when  he  has  guidance  from  above  in  any  of  the 
sessions?  Because  he  cannot  escape  it.  There  are 
many  men,  no  doubt,  who  would  be  glad  to  proceed 
without  it,  if  only  they  could;  for  this  matter  of 
Divine  guidance,  as  the  wise  old  Bible  suggests,  is 
not  without  terror  to  evil-doers.  Nevertheless,  it  is 
inescapable.     Evermore  the  good  and  bad  alike  are 

88 


DIVINE  GUIDANCE  IN  HUMAN  AFFAIRS      89 

guided  to  their  inevitable  end — Judas  to  his  own 
place,  and  Jesus  to  His  throne  of  mercy.  Other 
things  may  be  doubtful,  but  there  are  none  to  deny 
this  fundamental  fact.  From  the  first  man  has  felt 
that  he  was  led  by  an  Eternal  Power,  whose  mighty 
hand  he  could  neither  resist  nor  escape — Something 
which  he  has  called  Fate,  Force,  Chance,  Destiny, 
God.  No  matter  how  it  is  named,  every  man  knows 
that  without  it  he  could  not  live  out  a  day.  So,  then, 
the  real  question  is  not  as  to  the  fact  of  divine  guid- 
ance, but  as  to  its  nature  and  the  character  of  Him 
in  whose  great  hand  we  stand.  Let  us  discuss  this 
matter  together  briefly,  bringing  to  it  such  insight 
as  we  have,  albeit  unable  to  do  more  than  touch  the 
hem  of  such  a  theme  in  the  appointed  time. 

Now,  consider,  God  is  the  final  reality;  beyond 
Him  human  thdught  cannot  go,  short  of  Him  it  can- 
not rest  in  peace.  Thought  about  Him  is  thought  in 
its  longest  reach,  as  experience  of  Him  is  the  deepest 
need  of  humanity  and  its  highest  joy.  It  follows, 
as  a  consequence,  that  a  change  in  our  conception  of 
God  means  a  profound  change  in  all  our  thinking 
about  life,  its  meaning,  its  method,  and  its  goal.  Such 
a  change  is  now  passing  over  the  mind  of  man,  sur- 
passing all  the  more  superficial  and  astonishing 
changes  of  this  time  of  upheaval.  Not  for  nought 
have  men  been  talking  of  a  Vital  Urge,  a  Finite  God, 
and  other  like  forshadowings,  as  in  other  days  they 
were  wont  to  talk  of  an  Eternal  Energy  from  which 
all  things  proceed,  and  a  Stream  of  Tendency  making 
for   righteousness.      Men   to-day   are   seeking   not 


90  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

simply  a  Sovereign  who  reigns  in  majesty,  but  a  Sym- 
pathy which  no  vague  Energy,  no  mere  Stream  of 
Tendency  can  give.  They  cry  out  for  a  God  who  not 
only  reigns  afar,  but  for  a  God  who  helps  to  bear  the 
burden  and  shares  in  some  real  way  the  struggle  and 
agony  of  the  world.  A  God  who  is  above  all  and 
merely  a  looker-on  they  find  it  hard  to  believe  in,  and 
harder  still  to  love. 

Of  course,  every  such  passionate  aspiration  may 
take  crude  and  fumbling  forms,  but  it  is  bringing 
men  to  see  that  God  is  somehow  with  them  in  the 
trial  and  bloody  sweat  of  life.  More  and  more  they 
think  of  Him  as  ruling  the  world,  not  from  without 
as  the  potter  shapes  the  clay,  but  from  within  as  a 
flower  unfolds^ — the  universe  being  the  form  in 
which  the  Divine  reason  and  will  are  made  visible. 
The  old  deism,  with  its  ongoing  world  and  an 
absentee  Deity  who  made  occasional  inroads  into 
the  world  to  reveal  Himself,  is  dead.  By  the  same 
token,  the  growing  sense  of  the  divine  indwelling 
renders  many  dogmas  obsolete  and  many  debates 
useless — as,  for  example,  the  debate  about  miracles. 
The  commonest  event,  even  the  fall  of  a  leaf,  is  as 
divine  in  its  causation  as  any  miracle  could  be,  since 
in  both  alike  the  presence  of  God  is  manifest.  The 
fact  that  God  is  in  nature  does  not  mean  that  He  is 
here  and  there  working  wonders,  but  that  the  whole 
cosmic  order  depends  every  instant  upon  His  will 
and  power,  and  that  we  live  in  the  presence  of  His 
living  Will,  which  worketh  hitherto  and  worketh 
evermore. 


DIVINE  GUIDANCE  IN  HUMAN  AFFAIRS      91 

For  ages  our  humanity,  like  the  boy  in  the  story 
of  "The  Great  Stone  Face,"  watched  the  face  of 
nature,  not  knowing  whether  her  smile  was  one  of 
pity  or  of  indifferent  scorn.  She  presented  two 
aspects — loveliness  and  severity.  Amidst  scenes 
of  peace  and  beauty,  when  skies  were  soft  and  winds 
were  kind,  it  was  easy  to  believe  that  she  was  friendly. 
Even  in  the  night,  with  its  awful  depth  of  stars,  that 
faith  was  awake.  But  nature  had  other  moods,  when 
storms  ran  riot  and  the  foundations  of  the  deeps  were 
broken  up,  outbursts  of  power  when  men  were  swept 
away  like  insects.  Then  it  was  that  fear  came  upon 
man,  and  his  faith  wavered.  The  Lisbon  earthquake 
was  followed  by  an  epidemic  of  atheism,  unsettling 
the  faith  of  the  boy  Goethe.  Doubt  of  nature  haunted 
the  last  century  like  an  evil  dream,  and  Stuart  Mill 
concluded  that  'either  God  is  not  strong  enough  to 
prevent  its  cruelty  or  not  good  enough  to  care.  Even 
Tennyson  was  tormented  by  a  vision  of  nature  "red 
in  tooth  and  claw,"  so  careful  of  a  type,  so  careless 
of  a  single  life.  To-day  it  seems  a  far  cry  back  to 
such  a  mood,  a  memory  of  which  lingers  in  the  stories 
and  poems  of  Thomas  Hardy. 

Happily,  a  deeper  Insight  has  brought  us  to  a 
serener  confidence  in  the  beneficent  and  wise  order 
of  the  world,  as  may  be  seen  In  such  an  essay  as  that 
of  John  Burroughs  on  "The  Arrival  of  the  Fit." 
At  first  glance,  he  tells  us,  nature  may  seem  to  be 
ruled  by  a  law  of  disorder — collisions  In  the  heavens 
above,  waste  on  the  earth  below — ^but  that  is  only 
seeming.    There  is  something  more  than  hit-and-miss 


92  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

in  nature,  some  guiding  genius,  else  the  course  of 
evolution  would  never  have  arrived  at  man.  Forests 
get  themselves  planted  by  winds  and  currents,  but  oak 
and  elm  and  pine  each  finds  its  place  with  a  certain 
fitness  and  system.  Despite  seeming  waste,  order  and 
plan  appear,  and  myriad  forms  of  beauty,  showing  a 
spiritual  intelligence.  Often  God  seems  to  play  His 
right  hand  against  His  left,  but  what  one  loses  the 
other  gains,  and  so  nothing  is  lost.  Man  thinks  that 
nature  is  stern,  yet  all  the  while  she  is  his  teacher,  all 
his  inventions  being  imitations  of  her  devices,  all  his 
arts  efforts  to  reproduce  her  beauty.  Besides,  we  are 
here  in  a  world  good  to  be  in,  whose  method  we  are 
hardly  prepared  to  judge,  because  we  cannot  grasp  a 
plan  so  vast. 

Look  down  the  highway  of  history  along  which 
our  race  has  straggled,  coming  it  knows  not  whence, 
going  it  knows  not  whither.  Carlyle  wondered  how 
a  race  so  dull  that  its  eyes  seem  made  of  horn  man- 
aged to  stumble  forward.  Left  to  himself,  man  sits 
down  and  sings  praises  to  the  past,  overcome  by  a 
strange  inertia,  not  totally  depraved,  but  totally  lazy. 
If  there  has  been  progress  from  the  beginning,  as  no 
one  denies,  it  has  come  from  a  thought  behind  and 
above  humanity;  by  Divine  direction,  not  by  human 
intention.  That  is  to  say,  it  has  come  in  spite  of  man, 
or  else  by  man  acting  in  ignorance  of  the  great  design 
and  the  ultimate  end.  Any  faithful  account  of  history 
bears  witness  to  the  fact  of  Divine  guidance  in  human 
affairs,  so  much  so  that  its  records,  so  long  a  bible  of 
pessimism,  have  become  scrolls  of  hope.    Often,  to 


DIVINE  GUIDANCE  IN  HUMAN  AFFAIRS      93 

be  sure,  the  fact  of  Divine  guidance  is  hidden  in  the 
details  of  the  story,  but  it  is  unveiled  in  the  larger 
scene  and  the  longer  result.  Not  otherwise  can  we 
explain  the  progress  of  things  from  unreasoning 
elements,  the  turning  of  revolution  into  evolution, 
and  the  bringing  to  pass  of  that  of  which  man  never 
dreamed. 

At  last,  we  Americans,  as  Lord  Bryce  has  said, 
hold  by  this  fact  with  a  faith  that  is  akin  to  fatalism; 
no  doubt  going  too  far,  as  when  he  reminds  us  that 
"the  belief  in  the  rights  of  the  majority  lies  very 
near  to  the  belief  that  the  majority  is  right." 
Whereas  the  voice  of  the  people  is  not  always,  not 
often,  the  voice  of  God.  For  God  is  not  with  the 
many,  unless  the  many  are  with  Him,  and  they  are 
sometimes  far  from  Him.  Again  and  again  history 
has  shown  one  man  to  have  been  right  and  a  whole 
nation  wrong.  Divine  guidance  does  not  always 
come  in  the  shout  of  the  multitude,  any  more  than 
in  the  thunder  at  Mount  Horeb,  but  nearly  always 
in  the  still  small  voice  heard  by  a  few  lofty  and 
valiant  souls  called  prophets.  Always  it  is  the  lonely 
seer  who  climbs  the  Mount  of  Vision,  and  returns  to 
point  the  masses  to  the  better  way.  Yet  so  heedless 
is  humanity  that  it  has  become  a  refrain  of  history 
that  the  prophets  are  stoned  and  rejected,  and,  later, 
monuments  are  built  in  their  honour.  Still  it  is  the 
prophet,  not  the  historian,  not  the  scholar,  who  Is  our 
best  interpreter  and  guide,  and  in  the  end  we  must 
follow  him,  whether  we  will  or  no. 

Buckle    once    thought    that    there    might    be    a 


94  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

science  of  history;  that,  if  we  could  know  all  the 
facts  of  the  present,  we  could  predict  the  future 
accurately.  But  Froude,  Fiske,  and  Smith  took 
issue  with  him,  showing  that  we  can  no  more  tell 
what  a  day  will  bring  forth  than  we  can  foretell 
the  shape  the  clouds  will  take  at  sunset  to-morrow. 
A  spirit  plays  over  the  scene,  an  incalculable  element 
enters,  and  all  our  predictions  go  awry.  Gibbon  felt 
that  he  had  lived  to  see  the  end  of  war,  but  if  he 
had  lived  out  the  span  of  his  days  he  would  have  seen 
Europe  at  the  feet  of  Napoleon.  The  man  of  action 
more  keenly  than  any  other,  perhaps,  feels  both  the 
fact  and  the  mystery  of  Divine  guidance.  A  thinker 
can  retrace  his  steps  to  where  he  went  astray,  but 
when  a  thing  is  done  it  cannot  be  undone.  A  man  of 
action  must  decide  quickly  amid  the  stress  of  events, 
and  as  often  as  not  when  he  has  done  what  seems 
wisest  and  best,  his  plans  are  all  upset.  No  wonder 
so  many  leaders,  from  Caesar  to  Lincoln  and  Glad- 
stone, have  been  fatalists — ^that  is,  men  of  iron  faith 
— nothing  certain  to  them  but  an  unseen  Hand  put 
forth  from  the  darkness,  moving  the  figures  on  the 
board. 

Nor  is  there  any  such  Divine  guidance  in  human 
affairs  as  prevents  a  temporary  triumph  of  might 
over  right,  of  evil  over  good.  Surely  Jesus  was  the 
strongest,  whitest,  sweetest  soul  this  earth  has 
known,  and  yet  that  radiant  Being,  who  was  so  gentle, 
patient  and  heroic,  whose  heart  was  so  deep  that  the 
streams  of  slander  poured  Into  it  without  echo,  whose 
charity  was  so  large  that  It  folded  like  a  mantle  all 


DIVINE  GUIDANCE  IN  HUMAN  AFFAIRS      95 

who  wore  our  human  shape,  who  talked  of  all  men 
as  His  brothers  and  of  all  women  as  if  He  dreamed 
of  His  mother;  this  being,  who  sought  to  do  good, 
and  only  good,  always,  everywhere  to  everybody,  was 
falsely  accused,  betrayed  by  friends,  crowned  with 
thorns,  and  crucified  between  two  thieves.  Never 
was  the  history  of  brutahty  and  wrong  more  com- 
plete, more  crushing.  And  yet,  not  by  man,  but  in 
spite  of  man,  somehow,  out  of  it  came  unspeakable 
good,  as  out  of  the  new  crucifixion  of  humanity  to-day 
will  issue  untold  good  in  times  to  be.  It  must  be, 
then,  that  God  guides  our  race  by  slowly  incarnating 
Himself  in  it — that  is,  by  educating  humanity;  that 
He  is  in  history  guiding  it  by  slowly  enthroning  His 
spirit  in  the  minds  of  the  men  who  make  history.  If 
that  be  so,  then  His  kingdom  can  come  no  faster  than 
the  Divine  is  en'shrined  in  the  soul  of  the  race. 

Also,  if  many  must  fail  that  a  few  may  succeed 
a  little,  if  myriads  must  fall  that  their  sons  may  be 
free,  what  of  those  who  die?  What  of  the  multi- 
tudes who  are  ground  under  the  heel  of  tyranny, 
suffering,  praying,  fighting  for  the  freedom  of  those 
who  are  to  come  after  them !  Are  they  lost  and  cast 
aside,  as  so  much  rubbish  in  the  void?  If  so,  history 
is  a  tragedy  of  unrelieved  horror,  a  nightmare  so 
terrible  as  to  make  life  intolerable.  No ;  over  against 
this  dismal  dogma  rises  the  religious  vision  of  the 
world,  the  faith  that  nothing  walks  with  aimless  feet, 
and  that  not  one  life  shall  be  destroyed,  that  the  babe 
who  died  in  India  five  thousand  years  ago  did  not  fall 
as  an  autumn  leaf  to  rot  and  be  lost,  but  lives  to 


96  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

fulfil  its  ideal — yea,  that  the  wise  love  of  God  is  equal 
to  the  waywardness,  the  wilfulness  and  the  pathos 
of  man,  and  will  at  last  lead  every  wandering  human 
soul  to  Himself!  As  George  Macdonald  said,  "Un- 
less the  hairs  of  your  head  are  all  numbered,  there  is 
no  God,"  for  what  to  you  and  me  is  the  large  truth 
of  Divine  guidance  if  there  be  no  guiding  hand  in 
our  little  lives? 

Indeed,  the  one  truth  implies  and  includes  the 
other,  and  who  can  look  over  the  years  agone  and 
not  see,  like  the  man  who  wrote  the  Experiences 
of  a  Roving  Philosopher ,  little  touches  of  a  Hand 
that  shaped  his  course — like  that  little  stray  dog  that 
crept  into  the  arms  of  Jacob  Riis  when  he  had  gone 
down  to  the  river  to  drown  himself,  and  drew  him 
back  to  a  life  of  usefulness  and  honour.  Biography 
is  full  of  such  incidents,  telling  how  a  letter,  a  hand- 
shake, the  glimpse  of  a  face,  have  made  men  over 
and  altered  their  careers.  Nothing  is  more  wonder- 
ful in  the  retrospect  than  the  fact  that,  despite  our 
mistakes  and  the  shadows  that  covered  us,  another 
Presence  has  been  in  our  lives,  and  that  the  final  re- 
sult is  in  wiser  hands  than  ours.  It  must  be  that  the 
great  sermon  of  Horace  Bushnell  is  true — that 
"Every  man's  life  is  a  plan  of  God,"  that  there  is 
something  unique,  particular,  and  precious  in  each 
soul;  some  work  for  me  to  do  which  no  one  else  can 
do — my  path  being  pointed  out  by  my  aptitudes  and 
limitations;  and  that  my  business  is  to  find  my  place, 
do  my  work,  and  trust  the  great  God.  As  Stevenson 
said: 


DIVINE  GUIDANCE  IN  HUMAN  AFFAIRS     97 

"If  I,  from  my  spyhole,  looking  with  purblind  eyes  upon 
the  least  part  of  a  fraction  of  the  universe,  yet  perceive  in 
my  ow^n  life's  destiny  some  broken  evidences  of  a  plan  and 
some  signals  of  an  overruling  goodness,  shall  I  then  be  so 
mad  as  to  complain  that  all  cannot  be  deciphered?" 

To  realise  that  everything  noble  and  to  be  desired, 
by  pledge  of  our  Divine  inheritance,  will  be  ours  at 
last,  if  not  in  the  tiny  arc  of  to-day,  then  in  the 
larger  cycle  of  time  when  we  are  ready  and  worthy 
to  receive  it,  surely  this  is  a  truth  to  bring  peace 
and  courage  and  hope  !  Divine  guidance !  This  is 
it,  and  who  would  not  rejoice  that  by  the  decree  of 
Heaven  we  really  cannot  proceed  without  it?  It 
makes  life,  even  my  little  life,  more  worth  while,  and 
redeems  me  from  the  awful  sense  of  insignificance; 
yea,  it  makes  us  fellow-workers  with  the  Eternal, 
servants  of  His  truth,  helpers  of  His  will,  the  while 
it  begets  in  us  the  faith  that  He  will  guide  us  home. 

"From  Thee,  great  God,  we  spring, 
To  Thee  we  tend. 
Path,  motive,  guide,  original 
And  eternal  end." 


PROVIDENCE 

"There  shall  not  an  hair  of  your  head  perish." — 
Luke  xxi.  13. 

NO  truth  is  more  precious,  alike  for  strength  In 
life  and  hope  in  death,  than  the  truth  of  the 
Providence  of  God.  It  Is  the  great  roof  over  our 
human  world,  without  which  we  are  left  shelterless 
and  exposed.  Next  in  importance  to  the  fact  that 
God  exists  Is  the  faith  that  He  cares  for  men.  When 
that  faith  grows  dim  life  loses  most  of  Its  high  mean- 
ing, and  men  seem  like  motes  that  float  in  the  evening 
sunlight  doomed  to  die  in  the  dark.  Even  when  our 
faith  in  the  divine  care  is  bright  we  are  often  enough 
baffled,  but  to-day  that  faith  is  terribly  tried,  and 
men  everywhere  are  troubled  by  grave  questionings. 
Never  was  there  so  much  calamity,  and  not  a  few, 
giving  way  to  an  impulsive  lUogic,  have  lost  faith 
in  the  divine  care  of  men. 

When  days  are  overcast  we  must  not  chide  one 
another,  but  surely  It  Is  unwise  to  let  go  of  a  high 
faith  when  it  is  so  sorely  needed.  Least  of  all  should 
we  give  up  trust  in  Providence  until  we  have  inquired 
Into  its  purpose,  its  nature,  and  its  method.  Much 
of  our  confusion  may  come  of  our  not  having  thought 
things  through,  and  we  may  be  misreading  the  will 
of  the  Eternal  and  His  way  of  dealing  with  us.    Of 

98 


PROVIDENCE  99 

course,  not  a  little  will  remain  hidden  when  we  have 
thought  as  far  as  our  minds  can  go.  Inevitably  so, 
because  no  man  can  grasp  the  full  meaning  of  his 
own  life,  much  less  the  vast  plan  of  which  it  is  a  part. 
But  it  is  not  all  dark,  and  a  little  calm  thinking  will 
let  at  least  a  ray  of  light  through  the  shadow.  Let 
us  discuss  this  matter  reverently,  but  with  the  utmost 
frankness,  evading  no  real  difficulty,  seeking  to  know 
the  will  of  Him  in  whose  great  hand  we  stand. 

Faith  in  Providence  means  that  God  is  our  Pro- 
vider, our  Protector,  and  our  Preserver.  As  to  the 
first  of  these,  there  has  never  been  any  doubt.  Thus 
much  we  believe  if  we  believe  in  God  at  all,  Greek 
and  Roman  writers  were  eloquent  in  their  praise  of 
the  wise  and  bountiful  provision  for  the  welfare  of 
the  human  race,  but  beyond  that  fact  their  faith  did 
not  go.  When  they  tried  to  go  further,  misgiving 
began.  They  seemed  to  think  the  Supreme  Being  too 
great  to  be  concerned  with  the  details  of  the  life  of 
man :  whereas  in  the  teaching  of  Jesus  He  is  too  great 
not  to  do  it.  Hence  the  pathetic  refrain  in  classic 
lore,  "The  Gods  do  not  care."  In  one  form  or  an- 
other this  Idea  of  divine  indifference  pursued  the 
classic  mind  like  a  Nemesis,  casting  a  long  shadow 
over  it.  Nor  has  that  shadow  entirely  vanished  yet, 
despite  the  modern  vision  of  the  universal  reign  of 
law  and  the  increasing  sense  of  the  divine  indwelling. 
Let  a  great  disaster  befall  humanity,  such  as  that 
which  now  beshadows  us,  and  that  white-faced  fear 
grips  many  a  heart  with  an  icy  grasp,  and  almost 
freezes  faith. 


100  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

Time  out  of  mind  it  has  been  so.  Almost  from 
the  beginning  man  has  been  puzzled  by  the  apparent 
indifference  of  God  to  human  affairs,  and  His  seem- 
ing silence  to  the  cry  of  the  race.  Job,  sorely  smitten 
and  afflicted,  wished  that  he  might  find  God  and 
argue  the  matter;  and  Isaiah,  looking  up  from  his 
page,  said,  "Verily,  Thou  art  a  God  that  hidest  Thy- 
self." Even  Jesus  on  the  Cross  felt,  for  one  bitter 
moment,  that  He  was  forsaken  of  God.  Of  this 
hiding  of  God  there  is  no  doubt,  but  the  real  prob- 
lem is  to  interpret  the  meaning  of  it.  Manifestly, 
if  we  are  to  find  any  clue  to  the  arrangement  of  life, 
we  must  first  ask:  What  is  the  purpose  of  the  life 
of  man?  What  is  the  Eternal  Will  trying  to  do  with 
us  here  upon  the  earth?  Then  the  second  question 
follows  naturally:  Is  the  arrangement  of  life  as  we 
know  it  adapted  to  the  fulfilment  of  that  purpose? 
After  that  there  remains  but  one  other  question,  and 
that  is,  how  can  we  work  with  God  toward  the  real- 
isation of  the  divine  ideal  and  end  of  our  mortal 
life? 

What,  then,  is  the  purpose  of  human  life?  Man 
thinks  he  was  made  for  happiness,  by  which  he 
usually  means  health,  wealth,  home,  kin,  friends  and 
other  things  of  a  sort  similar.  But  happiness  cannot 
be  the  chief  end  of  life,  as  is  shown  by  the  fact  that 
those  who  make  it  their  first  quest  do  not  find  it. 
What  if  the  true  end  of  life  be  something  else,  some- 
thing higher,  fairer,  more  worth  while,  to  which  all 
these  things  are  incidental;  an  ideal  in  which  happi- 
ness itself  is  a  means,  not  an  end?    What  if  man  was. 


PROVIDENCE  101 

made  to  be  a  moral  creator  in  a  world  of  his  own — 
what  then?  As  a  matter  of  fact,  does  not  this  de- 
scribe more  truly  than  any  other  term  what  every  man 
knows  his  relation  to  life  to  be?  If  so,  do  we  not 
have  to  revise  some  of  our  hasty  judgments  as  to 
the  plan  of  human  life  in  general,  and  of  our  own  lot 
in  particular?  Our  life  here,  so  far  as  we  can  divine 
its  purpose,  is  a  process  of  divine  education,  meant 
to  fulfil  all  the  powers  of  our  nature — that  is,  to 
awaken  and  develop  the  soul.  How  do  we  know 
that  this  is  the  purpose  of  our  life?  Because  it  is 
the  only  basis  upon  which  life  is  intelligible,  the  only 
view  of  it  which  gives  it  dignity,  worth,  and  mean- 
ing. 

If  such  be  the  purpose  of  life,  surely  we  can  begin 
to  see  that  its  arrangement  is  admirably  adapted 
to  the  fulfilment  of  that  purpose.  What  is  the  ar- 
rangement? Let  me  illustrate  by  telling  you  of  the 
George  Junior  Republic,  in  which  a  man  of  my  coun- 
try found  a  solution  of  a  hard  social  problem.  He 
set  out  to  help  the  boys  who  are  too  often  left  to  run 
wild  and  uncared  for  in  our  great  cities,  especially 
recalcitrant  boys  who  defy  the  law.  His  plan  was  to 
gather  them  together  into  a  little  community  of  their 
own,  where,  under  wise  rules,  they  might  rule  them- 
selves, and  the  tiny  city  took  its  name  from  its  foun- 
der. There  they  made  their  own  laws,  instituted 
their  own  courts,  elected  their  own  officers,  and  in 
this  way  learned  citizenship  by  the  practice  of  it, 
their  wise  friend  living  with  them  the  while.  After 
this  manner,  boys  who  had  no  sense  of  law  or  re- 


102  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

sponslbility  were  made  into  noble  and  useful  men. 
Something  like  that  seems  to  be  the  plan  of  this  big 
Junior  Kingdom  which  we  call  the  world.  Man 
seems  to  have  been  given  dominion  over  a  tiny  king- 
dom within  the  Kingdom  of  God,  a  province,  so  to 
speak,  within  the  divine  providence  in  which  to  de- 
velop his  life  and  work  out  his  destiny. 

Under  the  wise  restrictions  of  universal  laws  the 
Divine  Father  allows  man  to  have  a  real  influence 
and  power  in  the  making  of  his  own  world,  and  pre- 
fers to  rule  men  in  and  through  men  themselves. 
Hence  the  apparent  withdrawal  of  God,  in  which 
lies  the  pathos,  the  terror,  and  the  glory  of  human 
life.  God  is  never  far  away — "in  Him  we  live  and 
move  and  have  our  being" — but  things  are  so  or- 
dered that  man  makes  his  own  world;  wisely  if  he 
works  in  harmony  with  the  law  of  God,  unwisely 
and  tragically  if  he  works  in  contempt  of  it.  At 
bottom  the  only  question  is,  whether  it  is  wise  and 
worth  while  for  man  to  have  so  large  a  share  in 
determining  his  own  life?  To  answer  that  question 
we  should  have  to  know  "the  far-off  divine  event 
to  which  the  whole  creation  moves,"  and  the  ulti- 
mate end  in  view.  That  we  do  not  know;  but  God 
knows  it,  and  He  thinks  the  end  justifies  the  risk  and 
peril  and  tragedy  of  the  process.  Even  we  can  see 
that  such  a  plan  recognises  the  reality  and  worth  of 
the  human  world,  and  provides  man  with  a  discipline 
such  as  he  could  not  get  in  any  other  way.  Not  only 
so,  but  it  evokes  and  develops  qualities  not  other- 
wise to  be  developed,  and  makes  for  the  attainment 


PROVIDENCE  103 

of    a    character   which    would   else   be    impossible. 

Here  is  the  answer,  in  part  at  least,  to  the  many 
dark  questions  which  rise  up  out  of  this  theme.  Why, 
with  a  good  and  wise  God,  is  not  our  world  perfect; 
why  weakness  and  disease,  wrong  and  suffering,  when 
with  such  powers  abroad  in  the  universe  there  might 
have  been  only  happiness?  Why  has  a  state  of  so- 
ciety been  allowed  in  which  the  rich  rob  the  poor,  and 
measureless  misery  and  woe  prevail?  Why  the  long 
story  of  man,  saturated  with  blood  and  blistered  with 
tears  ?  Why  should  Love  ever  be  crucified  by  cruelty 
and  hate?  Why  do  the  innocent  suffer  with  the 
guilty,  and  sometimes  suffer  when  the  guilty  osten- 
sibly escape?  Why  should  truth  be  on  the  scaffold 
and  wrong  on  the  throne?  Why  the  infinite  horror 
of  war,  desolating,  defiling,  devouring  the  race  in 
an  orgy  of  blood  and  lust  and  ruin?  That  is  to  ask, 
why  does  not  God  do  everything  for  man,  leaving 
him  to  live  at  ease  with  nothing  to  evoke  what  is 
heroic  and  godlike  in  him?  Would  that  be  a  better 
state  than  the  one  in  which  we  find  ourselves?  Why 
should  man  be  cured  by  miracle  of  his  ills  when, 
by  learning  to  cure  himself,  he  finds  not  only  health 
but  the  laws  of  health? 

Surely  freedom,  with  all  the  risk  of  using  it  wrong- 
ly, is  better  than  to  be  puppet  slaves  with  no  real  life 
of  our  own.  If  it  be  the  divine  intent  to  grow  pure, 
patient,  heroic  human  souls,  in  which  His  own  image 
shall  be  revealed,  it  is  possible  only  in  a  world  of 
hardship  and  struggle.  When  once  we  lay  hold  of 
this  fact,  the  sense  of  divine  guidance  in  our  outward 


104  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

life  will  grow  as  we  realise  this  providence  of  the 
inward  life.  This  does  not  mean  that  God  is  less 
near,  or  that  prayer  is  less  real  and  precious;  but  it 
does  help  us  to  see  why,  when  we  ask  God  to  do  for 
us  what  He  meant  we  should  do  for  ourselves.  He 
is  silent.  Suppose  that  by  some  portent  in  the  sky  the 
war  should  be  stopped  to-morrow,  what  then?  No 
problem  would  be  solved,  no  dispute  settled,  no  am- 
bition changed,  no  hatred  softened.  The  roots  of 
war  would  not  be  touched.  Horrible  as  it  is,  it  is 
better  that  it  go  to  the  end  that  man  himself  may 
learn  not  only  its  horror,  but  its  folly  and  crime. 
God  will  not  do  what  man  can  and  ought  to  do. 
Man  can  prevail  against  iniquity.  Man  can  over- 
throw injustice.  Therefore,  man  must,  and  in  doing 
it  he  becomes  not  only  more  just  himself,  but  he 
learns  that  justice  is  the  ceaseless  concern  of  God. 
Thus  God  works  for  man  in  and  through  man  and 
seldom,  if  at  all,  in  any  other  way.  If  mankind  is 
raised  to  better  and  nobler  things,  if  evils  are 
abolished,  it  is  always  through  high  and  faithful  hu- 
man effort.  By  as  much  as  righteousness  is  incar- 
nated in  human  character  and  activity,  by  so  much 
does  it  triumph  upon  the  earth — and  no  more.  Truth 
asks  for  human  voices  to  utter  its  message,  justice 
needs  human  hands  to  work  its  bidding — sweet 
voices  and  clean  hands  to  join  the  streets  of  the  city 
of  man  to  the  streets  of  the  City  of  God.  The  di- 
vine does  not  invade  the  human  world  for  conquest. 
He  is  here,  moving  us  with  inspirations,  exalting  us 
with  dreams,  alluring  us  with  visions,  and  stirring 


PROVIDENCE  105 

us  with  mighty  hopes;  but  He  does  not  Intrude, 
except  at  times  to  overrule  huge  blunders  and  save 
man  from  destroying  himself.  Such  seems  to  be  the 
method  of  Divine  Providence,  and  it  throws  a  re- 
vealing light  over  the  long  tragic  story  of  man. 

Looking  backward,  one  sees  no  lack  of  divine 
providence,  but  an  amazing  display  of  the  most 
stupid,  thick-witted  human  improvidence.  What 
shortsightedness,  what  waste,  what  an  enormous 
range  of  woeful  experience,  what  immeasurable 
suffering;  and  the  guilty  party  was  man,  not  God. 
Visitors  to  Naples  tell  us  that  vineyards  are  growing 
far  up  the  slopes  of  Vesuvius  well  within  the  danger 
zone.  This,  too,  notwithstanding  the  tragedies  of 
successive  generations,  and  the  ruins  of  buried  cities 
nearby.  Nor  are  those  peasants  the  only  incredibly 
stupid  men  now -upon  earth.  The  neglect  of  sanita- 
tion, the  annual  harvest  of  infant  mortality,  the 
crowding  of  masses  into  the  slums  to  rot,  the  insanity 
of  war,  the  spread  of  loathsome  diseases  which  pol- 
lute human  love  and  blight  its  offspring — these,  and 
a  thousand  other  ills,  spawn  of  selfishness  and  stupid- 
ity, belong  under  the  same  head.  Surely  man  will  yet 
learn  wisdom  from  the  failures  of  the  past,  and  not 
go  on  repeating  them  on  a  vaster  scale.  But  he  Is 
still  a  gambler,  thinking  that  by  some  chance  or 
magic  he  can  escape  the  results  of  his  folly. 

Therefore,  for  the  defeat  of  Ignorance,  and  all  the 
woes  that  issue  from  It,  we  look  to  God  as  He  works 
through  man.  By  the  same  token,  we  must  be  His 
fellow-workers  if  our  life  Is  to  have  epic  worth  and 


106  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

meaning.  Your  life  and  mine  may  seem  to  signify 
little  in  so  large  a  world,  but  we  can  be,  each  to  the 
extent  of  his  ability  and  all  with  equal  fidelity,  labour- 
ers together  with  the  Eternal.  Our  life,  though  it  be 
a  day  soon  done,  can  help  to  make  all  other  days 
better,  and  add  its  breath  to  the  making  of  an  atmos- 
phere in  which  injustice  cannot  live.  Also,  when  hu- 
man providence  has  done  its  utmost,  we  must  rely 
at  last  upon  a  providence  wiser  than  our  wisest  and 
tenderest  wisdom.  Life  was  meant  to  be  heroic. 
We  are  in  jeopardy  every  hour,  and  must  daily  face 
the  final  bereavement  which  waits  for  every  man. 
When  we  have  put  forth  all  our  foresight  and  skill, 
our  light  shines  but  a  little  way,  and  we  must  trust 
Him  in  whose  wise,  protecting  care  we  live  and  die. 
Faith  is  the  last,  as  it  is  the  first,  necessity  of  mortal 
life.  But  is  there  no  higher  word  for  us  to  take  with 
us  as  we  go  to  the  duty  and  danger  of  the  morrow? 
Indeed,  yes ;  and  for  this  we  turn  to  Him  who  taught 
us  that  God  cares  for  each  one  of  us,  despite  our  care- 
lessness. The  faith  of  Jesus  rested,  first,  upon  what 
God  is,  and,  second,  upon  what  man  Is,  revealing  the 
love  of  God  which  cares  for  a  son  made  in  His  like- 
ness. Holding  this  faith,  in  every  age  devout  men 
have  felt  themselves  In  the  hand  of  a  living,  personal, 
particular  providence.  No  one  can  prove  such  a 
faith  to  another.  It  is  to  be  argued  about.  It  is  a 
great  and  blessed  experience  open  to  all,  and  happy 
are  those  who  win  it  in  the  midst  of  the  yekrs.  No 
one  has  put  this  matter  better  than  Browning  In  his 
Christmas  Eve: 


PROVIDENCE  107 

"I  can  but  testify 
God's  care  for  me — no  more,  can  I — 
It  is  but  for  myself  I  know ; 

No  mere  mote's  breath  but  teems  immense 
With  witnessings  of  providence: 

Have  I  been  sure,  this  Christmas-Eve, 

God's  own  hand  did  the  rainbow  weave, 

Whereby  the  truth  from  heaven  slid 

Into  my  soul?     I  cannot  bid 

The  world  admit  He  stooped  to  heal 

My  soul;  as  if  in  thunder-peal, 

Where  one  heard  noise  and  one  saw  flame, 

I  only  knew  He  named  my  name." 


THE  MINISTRY  OF  SORROW 

"So  I  spake  unto  the  people  in  the  morning:  and  at  even 
my  wife  died." — Ezekiel  xxiv.  i8. 

ALMOST  no  facts  of  a  personal  kind  are  to  be 
found  in  the  writings  of  the  great  Hebrew 
prophets.  Only  here  and  there  a  hint  is  dropped 
that  each  had  his  own  home,  and  that  behind  the 
majesty  of  his  public  ministry  flowed  a  little  stream 
of  private  affection.  Once  or  twice  the  curtain  is 
lifted  for  a  moment,  and  we  have  a  ghmpse  of  the 
home  of  the  prophet,  his  wife,  his  child.  The  two 
children  of  Isaiah,  with  their  gotesque  names,  is  an 
example;  the  tragedy  in  the  home  of  Hosea  is  an- 
other. Always  it  is  for  the  same  reason  that  the 
fleeting  glance  at  the  prophet  in  his  human  relations 
is  granted  us.  That  is  to  say,  when  his  personal 
experience  serves  his  purpose  as  a  symbol  or  a  par- 
able of  his  public  message. 

Who  does  not  feel  his  heart  ache  as  he  reads  the 
poignant  story  of  the  bitter  bereavement  of  Ezekiel? 
Though  so  many  dim  centuries  have  flowed  past,  it 
moves  us  still:  the  anguish  of  a  lifetime  told  in  the 
studied  reticence  of  a  few  words.  It  is  doubly  sad 
when  we  remember  that  there  was  never  a  lonelier 
soul  than  Ezekiel,  who  was  doomed  to  live  in  an 
alien  land,  and  to  deliver  a  message  to  which  there 

1 08 


THE  MINISTRY  OF  SORROW  109 

was  no  response.  Only  one  consolation  was  left  him. 
At  the  end  of  a  day  of  fruitless  exhortation  he  was 
assured  of  a  welcome  at  home,  and  "the  desire  of  his 
eyes"  was  at  his  side.  Vague  is  the  figure  of  his 
wife,  but  this  we  know,  she  was  greatly  loved. 

Suddenly  the  blow  fell.  Whether  by  some  dark 
plague,  or  by  mysterious  failure  of  life,  with  but  brief 
warning,  he  was  left  utterly  alone.  The  agony  of 
parting,  shared  or  unshared,  scarred  for  ever  his 
memory  of  that  day,  and  as  the  night  fell  he  was  left 
desolate. 

Yet  his  public  duty  could  not  be  foregone.  As  if 
to  mock  his  grief,  he  was  forbidden  the  poor  re- 
sources for  the  alleviation  of  his  sorrow.  He  had  to 
appear  next  morning  as  if  nothing  had  happened, 
as  if  he  did  not  care,  as  if  that  black  day  was  like 
any  other  day.  Never  was  the  hand  of  God  laid 
heavier  upon  the  heart  of  a  man.  But  somehow 
strength  was  given  him  for  that  day,  and  if  he 
suffered  as  a  man  he  triumphed  as  a  prophet.  At 
last  his  fellow  exiles,  startled  out  of  their  impene- 
trable indifference,  were  no  longer  dull  of  ear  and 
intractable  in  argument.  They  became  inquirers, 
and  the  message  of  God  could  be  delivered.  The 
unutterable  sorrow  which  shut  Ezekiel  into  lifelong 
solitude,  and  made  the  joy  of  the  hearthstone  but  a 
memory,  had  not  been  in  vain.  Surely  it  is  worth 
while  to  recall  this  tragedy,  when  tidings  of  sorrow 
come  every  morning  to  more  than  two  thousand 
homes  in  this  land  alone.    Private  griefs  are  the  price 


110  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

of  the  awakening  of  a  nation  and  the  liberty  of  the 
world,  and  God  thinks  it  worth  while. 

Sorrow  is  more  spiritual  than  pain,  more  exalting 
and  more  revealing — albeit  the  two  are  often  inter- 
woven in  the  web  of  our  lives.  While  we  cannot 
fathom  all  the  mystery  of  sorrow,  so  far  from  being 
a  cloud  over  reason,  it  illumines  it,  and  may  become 
a  source  of  insight.  This  at  least  is  true:  whatever 
is  higher  than  happiness  is  revealed  to  us  only  by 
the  loss  of  happiness,  and  that  which  is  highest  of  all 
finds  little  place  in  us  until  we  have  walked  the  sor- 
rowful way.  An  old  mystic  said,  speaking  out  of  his 
deep  and  tender  wisdom,  "Were  there  anything 
nobler  than  sorrow,  God  would  have  redeemed  us 
by  it."  Among  the  qualities  which  sorrow  should 
foster  in  us  let  me  name  three — chief  of  which  is 
Courage.  Mark  Rutherford  was  right  when  he 
said  that  courage  is  the  root  of  every  virtue,  one 
of  the  greatest  possible  qualities  of  character.  Who 
has  purged  himself  of  fear  can  look  straight  into  the 
face  of  life  and  walk  with  soul  erect  and  untroubled. 
Louise  Wilcox,  in  her  little  essay  on  "The  Road  to 
Joy,"  which  she  is  wise  enough  to  know  leads  through 
sorrow,  writes  these  golden  words : 

"When  you  come  to  think  of  it,  courage  is  the  one  virtue 
never  to  be  spared.  Gentleness  may  be  swallowed  up  in 
righteous  indignation,  pity  in  justice;  truth  may  be  set  to 
one  side  by  tenderness  or  tact.  Only  courage  is  unalterable, 
and  stands  by  us  and  never  betrays  us.  The  body  may 
sicken,  but  the  indomitable  spirit  rides  the  storm.  The 
brave  soul  may  blunder,  but  never  irretrievably ;  or  if,  worn 


THE  MINISTRY  OF  SORROW  111 

out,  he  must  fall  at  last,  he  falls  alone.  Only  the  weakling 
drags  others  down  in  his  ruin.  Courage  steadies  the  hand 
and  clears  the  brain.  It  changes  the  odds.  The  brave  soul 
has  three  chances  to  one.  Once  we  have  learned  the  trick, 
it  is  easy  to  be  brave.  Live  one  minute  at  a  time.  Surely 
you  can  stand  a  minute.  If  you  give  up,  it  is  because  you 
cannot  bear  the  years,  next  month,  not  because  you  cannot 
stand  the  moment  now.  It  may  all  change  in  a  moment.  It 
is  so  the  brave  man  lives.  Courage,  after  all,  is  but  an  ad- 
junct of  simplicity  of  mind,  singleness  of  purpose." 

What  most  of  us  are  seeking  is  security,  if  not  for 
ourselves,  at  least  for  those  whom  we  love  more 
than  we  love  our  own  lives.  But  security  is  just 
the  one  thing  a  human  being  cannot  have.  Indeed, 
it  is  the  damnation  of  him  who  gets  it.  It  disinte- 
grates a  man.  Why  it  is  so  is  hard  to  know,  but 
it  is  so.  What  we  need  is  not  security,  but  a  mastery 
over  life,  and  only  courage  can  give  it  to  us.  Each 
of  us  should  take  every  reasonable  precaution,  but 
we  must  never  forget  that  life  is  the  great  adven- 
ture. Not  love,  not  marriage,  not  business — they  are 
only  chapters  in  the  book.  The  great  thing  is  to  take 
the  road  fearlessly,  to  have  courage,  to  live  out  our 
life  at  its  best.  Mastery!  It  comes  only  with  the 
knowledge  of  our  power  to  endure;  no  one  is  safe 
until  he  can  stand  everything  that  can  happen  to  him. 
Courage  is  security,  and  there  is  no  other  kind.  It 
is  not  sorrow,  but  the  fear  of  it,  that  unnerves  us. 
When  a  man  has  felt  the  worst  life  can  inflict,  he  is 
free.  There  is  nothing  then  for  him  to  fear,  and  he 
can  be  a  helper  of  his  trembling  fellow  mortals. 


112  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

But  to  courage  he  must  add  that  sweet  healing 
grace  of  sympathy,  without  which  no  one  can  really 
help  his  fellows.  From  his  sorrow  Ezekiel  learned 
sympathy,  and  when  he  was  sent  to  the  captives  by 
the  river  Chebar,  and  found  them  hanging  their 
harps  on  the  willows,  unable  to  sing  the  songs  of  the 
Lord  in  a  strange  land,  he  knew  how  to  take  his 
place  dumbly  by  their  side:  "I  sat  where  they  sat." 
Surely  that  is  the  perfection  of  sympathy,  to  be  able 
to  sit  where  another  sits,  to  see  from  his  point  of 
view,  and  to  suffer  with  him  in  the  silence  of  a  sor- 
row too  great  for  words.  The  bitter  bereavement 
of  the  prophet  prepared  him  for  a  ministry  of 
sympathy,  than  which  there  is  no  service  more 
needed  in  a  world  scarred  by  griefs  and  graves.  The 
instance  of  John  Bright  is  familiar.  Bereaved  of  his 
young  wife,  he  received  a  visit  of  condolence  from 
Cobden.  What  words  of  sympathy  Cobden  may  have 
uttered  we  do  not  know,  but  after  a  time  he  looked 
up  and  said:  "Bright,  there  are  thousands  and  thou- 
sands of  homes  in  England  at  this  moment  where 
wives  and  mothers  and  children  are  dying  of  hunger. 
Now,  when  the  first  paroxysm  of  your  grief  is  passed, 
I  would  advise  you  to  come  with  me,  and  we  will 
never  stop  until  the  Corn  Laws  are  repealed."  And 
so  it  came  about;  he  thought  of  others  and  bore  his 
grief,  and  his  sympathy  lent  wings  to  his  words. 

Often  Ibsen  seems  to  lose  his  wings  and  gives  us 
only  a  sociological  clinic,  but  when  he  wrote  Little 
Eyolf  his  insight  was  deep  and  revealing.  It  is  the 
drama  of  the  tragical  awakening  of  two  intensely 


THE  MINISTRY  OF  SORROW  113 

self-centred  beings  to  the  moral  responsibilities  of 
life.  As  usual  in  an  Ibsen  play,  the  drama  has  be- 
gun before  the  curtain  rises.  Alfred  Allmers  has 
been  writing  a  great  book,  but  he  concludes  that  the 
best  of  a  man  goes  into  his  thinking,  and  that  what 
he  puts  on  paper  is  of  little  worth.  His  wife,  whose 
Intense  absorption  in  him  is  partly  sensual  and  wholly 
selfish,  is  jealous  of  their  little  boy,  whose  coming 
was  unwelcomed  and  unwanted.  Little  Eyolf  is  a 
cripple,  whose  infirmity  may  be  traced  to  the  sin  of 
his  parents,  and  who  is  unloved  save  by  the  warm 
heart  of  his  aunt.  A  frightful  catastrophe  falls  and 
the  boy  is  drowned,  but  not  before  the  awakening  of 
his  father  had  begun. 

"Can  you  conceive  the  meaning  of  a  thing  like  this 
that  has  been  done  to  Rita  and  me?"  groans  the 
father.  "The  meaning,  I  say,  for,  after  all,  there 
must  be  a  meaning  in  it.  Life,  existence,  destiny, 
cannot  be  utterly  meaningless." 

Soon  dim  meanings  begin  to  glimmer  through 
their  woe,  though  at  first  they  can  only  see  that  "sor- 
row makes  us  wicked  and  hateful."  They  begin  to 
wonder  whether  the  dead  boy  had  been  anything 
more  to  them  than  a  "little  stranger  boy,"  whether 
he  had  not  meant  more  to  the  gentle  aunt  who  had 
taken  him  to  her  heart  the  moment  he  became  a 
cripple;  whether  they  had  not  gone  on  demanding 
more  of  life  and  of  each  other,  and  giving  nothing. 
There  follows  a  scene  which,  for  reproaches,  accu- 
sations, and  pitiless  self-torture,  has  hardly  another 
to  surpass  it.     Blind,  bitter,  and  hateful,  they  grope 


114  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

their  way  slowly  to  the  word  Retribution,  and  they 
begin  to  see  that  life  means  giving,  not  getting.  Sen- 
sualism and  selfishness  begin  to  give  way;  sorrow 
ceases  to  mean  only  deprivation,  and  they  know  that 
their  boy  was  not  born,  nor  did  he  die  in  vain.  The 
sun  sinks  beneath  the  waters  of  the  fiord,  and  a  cry- 
ing comes  to  them  from  the  village  of  fisher  folk  on 
the  beach  below  their  villa — the  crying  of  children 
neglected  and  abused.  The  mother-heart  of  Rita 
opens  wide,  and  she  vows  to  take  into  her  desolate 
home  those  little  ones  whose  homes  are  desolate. 

"I  will  take  them  to  my  heart  in  our  little  Eyolf's 
place.  There  is  an  empty  place  within  me  and  I 
must  try  to  fill  it  with  something — with  something 
like  love." 

It  all  moves  slowly,  tenderly,  softly  to  a  climax 
so  exquisite  that  the  pathos  of  it  makes  the  heart 
ache.  It  is  very  solemn,  very  beautiful,  very  won- 
derful. The  red  sun  sinks  into  the  sea.  The  white 
moonlight  envelops  husband  and  wife  as  they  look 
out  from  the  terrace  of  the  villa  upon  the  waters 
beneath  which  their  boy  sleeps.  They  have  found 
peace,  "a  Sabbath  peace,"  the  wife  calls  it,  in  the 
only  way  that  mortals  can  ever  find  it;  that  is,  by 
being  lifted,  through  sorrow,  into  a  wider  sympathy 
and  service.  Such  is  the  law  of  the  world  as  read 
by  all  who  walk  the  shadowy  way  with  courage  and 
faith.  It  is  not  tears,  nor  yet  the  clenched  hand  and 
compressed  lips  and  the  grim,  tense  silence  that  speak 
of  a  grief  bravely  borne  and  triumphed  over.  No, 
it  is  when  from  a  secretly  aching  heart  there  is  sent 


THE  MINISTRY  OF  SORROW  115 

the  Impulse  to  stretch  out  a  heartening  hand  to  an- 
other, and  when  words  of  sympathy  flow  from  the 
lips  that  might  have  been  written  with  their  own 
grief — It  Is  then  that  the  victory  Is  won. 

If  taken  aright,  sorrow  has  a  deep  religious  mis- 
sion; It  gives  us  the  power  of  insight,  which  adds  a 
new  dimension  to  life,  unveiling  what  else  would  be 
dim.  So  all  seers  agree,  from  the  far  time  when 
the  teachers  of  India  said  that  before  the  eyes  can  see 
clearly,  they  must  be  washed  with  tears;  and  before 
the  voice  can  speak  the  highest  truth.  It  must  have 
lost  its  power  to  wound.  That  this  Is  true,  the  life  of 
the  prophet  Hosea — the  Whittier  of  Hebrew  poetry 
— ^bears  witness.  All  through  his  prophecy  we  can 
trace  the  tragedy  of  his  broken  home,  the  Infidelity 
of  his  wife,  and  how  his  renewed  trust  In  women  was 
shattered — how  his  love  was  wounded  to  death,  but 
still  lived  on  In  pity.  There  is  no  other  explanation 
adequate  of  his  amazing  Insight  into  the  thwarted 
tenderness  of  God  for  His  people.  When  rightly 
read,  the  story  that  seems  too  shocking  Is  the  unveil- 
ing of  sorely  tried  love,  both  In  man  and  In  God. 
The  cost  of  revelation  Is  laid  bare  before  our  eyes. 
Of  many  a  page  of  the  Bible  It  may  be  said,  If  the 
love  of  God  Inspired  it,  the  sorrow  of  man  was. 
needed  before  It  could  be  written  down. 

Courage,  Sympathy,  Insight;  power  to  endure,  a 
heart  to  feel,  and  eyes  to  see — if  sorrow  can  give  us 
these  things,  It  has  a  benign  and  redeeming  ministry 
to  the  soul.  Not  all  win  such  trophies  from  their 
sorrow,  but  it  is  possible  for  all  to  do  so.    Fire  burns 


116  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

wood,  it  hardens  clay,  it  softens  steel.  One  man  is 
ruined  by  a  great  sorrow,  another  is  redeemed;  it 
depends  on  how  we  meet  it,  and  in  what  spirit. 
Weak  yielding  is  as  fatal  as  bitter  rebellion,  but  if 
we  meet  our  sorrow  as  George  Matheson  met  his, 
there  will  be  granted  us  a  sense  of  "the  love  that  will 
not  let  us  go,"  and  a  new  fellowship  with  Him  who, 
being  made  perfect  through  suffering,  became  our 
Leader  and  our  Saviour. 


THE  GOD  OF  COMFORT 

"The  Father  of  mercies,  and  the  God  of  all  comfort; 
who  comforteth  us  in  all  our  tribulation,  that  we  may  be 
able  to  comfort  them  which  are  in  any  trouble." — 2  COR. 
i-  3.  4- 

SOME  one  has  said  that  the  deep  difference  be- 
tween men  is  their  capacity  for  sympathy,  and 
that  the  future  is  with  those  who  have  most  of  it.  If 
that  be  so,  surely  St.  Paul  must  be  reckoned  as  one 
of  the  greatest  of  men,  because  his  heart  was  a  foun- 
tain of  sympathy  always  overflowing.  There  was 
something  haunting  in  the  pity  of  the  man,  some- 
thing healing  in  his  tenderness,  and  the  older  he 
grew  the  richer  it  became.  In  nothing  was  he  more 
like  his  Master,  whose  he  was,  and  whom  he  served, 
and  to  reproduce  whose  life  was  his  sacred  ambition. 
Hence  the  words  of  this  text,  which  touch  the  heart 
and  melt  it,  turning  its  sorrow  into  song. 

If  taken  out  of  their  context,  one  would  hardly 
guess  that  these  words  were  written  to  a  Church 
perplexed,  divided,  torn  by  scandal,  and  threatened 
with  disaster,  many  of  whose  members  had  critic- 
ised the  Apostle  cruelly.  Even  so,  instead  of  taking 
his  critics  to  task,  he  strikes  the  note  of  comfort 
and  compassion,  as  he  would  do  if  he  were  speaking 
to  the  Church  of  to-day,  so  sorely  tried,  so  bafiled 

117 


118  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

and  confused.  Too  many  hard  words  have  been 
aimed  at  the  Church.  Criticism  is  too  easy;  any- 
body can  indulge  in  it.  Whatever  may  be  said  of 
the  shortcomings  of  the  Church,  and  no  doubt  they 
are  many,  it  has  not  failed  in  its  attitude  of  com- 
passion towards  the  world-tragedy.  And  just  now 
its  ministry  lies  there,  or  nowhere.  What  we  need 
is  the  triumphant  faith  of  St.  Paul,  the  song  of  one 
who  had  found  a  medicine  for  all  ills,  a  solace  for  all 
sorrows,  in  the  God  of  Comfort. 

Here  is  a  vision  of  God,  the  compassionate  and 
merciful  Comforter  of  humanity;  and  what  a  field 
there  is  for  His  benign  activity  to-day !  Never  was 
the  world  so  full  of  tragedy,  horror,  and  atrocity. 
The  nations  are  wrapped  In  shadow  and  all  life  is 
darkened.  The  earth  is  stained  with  blood.  Cal- 
amities sweep  whole  continents.  Every  household, 
every  heart  is  pierced  and  suffering.  Strong  men 
go  about  the  streets  lonely,  bewildered,  yearning, 
wounded.  The  world  is  bereaved.  There  are  thou- 
sands of  dying  children,  and  mothers  who  want  to 
die.  Death,  disaster,  and  famine  are  comrades. 
Our  human  march  Is  a  requiem,  and  the  sounds  that 
fill  the  earth  are  the  sounds  of  battle  and  mourning. 
At  such  a  time,  and  In  such  a  world,  we  must  turn 
to  Him  who  can  comfort  us,  so  that  we  may  be  able 
to  comfort  others.  Across  the  ages,  like  the  tones  of 
an  evening  bell,  come  the  words  of  the  Prophet  to 
the  pulpit  of  to-day:  "Comfort  ye,  comfort  ye.  My 
people,  salth  your  God!"  What  is  comfort?  Truly 
it    is    more    than    ease,    more    than    consolation, 


THE  GOD  OF  COMFORT  119 

more  than  those   Influences  which  succour  distress, 
soothe    suffering,    and    alleviate    grief.      It    is    not 
simply   a   stoic   resignation   which   submits,   but  the 
strength  to  bear  and  triumph.     Unfortunately  the 
finer,  firmer  meaning  of  the  word  has  been  well- 
nigh  lost  in  the  idea  of  consoling.     To  comfort,  in 
the  true  sense,  is  to  make  another  strong  with  our 
strength;  to  share  our  strength  with  him,  because  at 
the  moment  he  has  less  than  he  needs  and  we  have 
more    than    the    occasion    requires.      Turning    his 
thoughts  away  from  his  sorrow,  reminding  him  that 
he  is  not  alone  in  his  grief,  and  recalling  the  memory 
of  happy  days  agone  or  the  hope  of  better  days  to  be 
— surely  that  is  a  benign  ministry.     But  we  must  re- 
turn to  the  deeper  meaning  of  comfort  at  a  time  when 
It  is  so  much  needed,  if  so  that  we  may  learn  to  give 
somewhat  of  ourselves  to  those  smitten  and  afllicted. 
The  derivation  of  the  word  is  eloquent :  It  means  that 
which  we  take  alongside  to  support  and  sustain  us 
— just  as  the  word  "tribulation"  in  the  text  means 
that  which  rubs,  irritates,  and  makes  the  heart  sore. 
An  English  essayist  once  said  that  if  he  could  be 
reborn  and  live  on  earth  again,  he  thought  he  should 
like  to  be  a  tug-boat.     Of  course,  a  tug-boat  is  very 
small,  and  its  labour  Is  confined  to  the  harbour,  but 
It  can  answer  a  signal  for  aid,  and  tow  a  great  ship 
out  of  trouble  Into  safety — coming  alongside  In  time 
of  need.    To-day  men  are  signalling  for  aid,  silently, 
pathetically — longing  for  Something  or  Some  one 
to  come  alongside  and  help.     Now,  God  is  ever 


120  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

alongside  each  of  us,  closer  than  we  realise,  and,  as  a 
fact,  we  depend  upon  Him  more  than  we  are  aware. 

"And  thus  by  day  and  night  unconsciously 
The  heart  lives  by  that  faith  the  lips  deny, 
God  knoweth  why." 

Yes,  unconsciously;  for  It  Is  not  so  much  that  men 
deny  God,  but  that  they  do  not  realise  how  much  they 
trust  Him  In  whom  they  live  and  move.  There  is  in 
humanity  a  great  unconfessed  faith,  to  interpret 
which  Is  a  large  part  of  the  ministry  of  a  teacher  of 
religion.  Every  man  has  a  mystic  sense  of  God — 
dim,  perhaps,  but  none  the  less  real  because  dim — 
by  which  he  is  sustained  in  the  often  strange  medley 
of  his  experience.  All  about  us  to-day  we  see  folk 
who  talk  nothing  of  religion,  and  yet  they  display  a 
sublime  and  heroic  faith  which  neither  they  nor  we 
can  explain.  Even  those  of  us  who  fancy  that  we 
are  religious  often  attribute  to  Time,  and  not  to 
God,  the  benign  influence  by  which  a  great  sorrow 
is  healed  and  at  last  changed  into  something  rich  and 
revealing.  In  answer  to  the  question  of  a  young 
clergyman  as  to  her  religious  belief,  Lizzie  Case  re- 
plied that  it  was  the  inherited  faith  of  her  fathers — 
the  Friends.  Whereupon  the  young  zealot  said  that 
she  was  an  unbeliever  and  would  be  lost.  "Never!" 
she  cried.  "If  there  were  no  true  God  to  trust  I 
should  still  believe  in  the  gods  of  the  woods  and 
the  streams.  In  fact,  I  believe  in  everything — in 
God,  nature,  man — ^there  is  no  unbelief!"     And  yet 


THE  GOD  OF  COMFORT  121 

she  it  was  who  wrote  the  lines,  one  stanza  of  which 
has  just  been  quoted : 

"There  is  no  unbeh'ef! 
Who  plants  a  seed  beneath  the  sod, 
And  waits  to  see  it  push  away  the  clod, 
Trusts  he  in  God. 

There  is  no  unbelief! 
Whoever  looks  on  when  dear  eyelids  close, 
And  dares  to  live  when  life  has  only  woes, 

God's  comfort  knows." 

Thus  God  comforts  us  in  myriad  ways  beyond  our 
tracing,  even  when  we  are  unaware  of  His  presence, 
as  these  lovely  lines  tell  us.  To  be  more  specific. 
He  comforts  us,  first  of  all,  by  the  fact  that  He  is. 
Often  we  are  not  able  to  follow  His  footsteps;  but 
the  fact  that  He  exists,  that  His  Hand  is  on  the 
helm,  that  His  will  is  working  through  seeming  chaos 
— such  a  faith  gives  us  strength  to  live.  To  a  child 
wakened  in  the  night  and  frightened  by  the  dark- 
ness, the  voice  of  its  father  in  the  next  room  is  a  com- 
fort— just  to  know  that  he  is  there  is  enough.  Just 
so,  to  know  that  God  is  there  is  the  comfort  and 
solace  of  mankind  in  the  night  of  time :  which  may 
be  the  meaning  of  the  mysteriously  august  and  haunt- 
ing name  of  God  in  the  earlier  books  of  the  Bible, 
where  He  is  called  the  great  *T  AM."  Herein  lies 
the  bitter  tragedy  of  atheism — there  is  no  one  there, 
and  man  is  left  to  wander  in  a  labyrinth  homeless 
and  alone.     Surely  there  is  no  keener  pain  than  a 


U2  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

loss  of  the  sense  of  the  reality  of  God,  doubly  so  for 
a  refined  and  sensitive  nature,  as  witness  the  words 
of  Nietzsche  lamenting  the  loss  of  his  right  to  pray 
— words  which  move  like  the  overture  of  a  great 
symphony  of  despair: 

"Never  more  wilt  thou  pray,  never  more  worship,  never 
more  repose  in  boundless  trust — thou  renouncest  the  priv- 
ilege of  standing  before  an  ultimate  wisdom,  an  ultimate 
mercy,  an  ultimate  power,  and  unharnessing  thy  thoughts — 
thou  hast  no  constant  watcher  and  friend  for  thy  seven 
solitudes — thou  livest  without  gazing  upon  a  mountain  that 
hath  snow  on  its  head  and  fire  at  its  heart — there  is  now 
no  redeemer  for  thee,  no  one  to  promise  a  better  life — there 
is  no  more  reason  in  that  which  happens,  no  love  in  that 
which  shall  happen  to  thee — thy  heart  hast  now  no  resting- 
place,  where  it  needeth  only  to  find,  not  to  seek — thou  re- 
fusest  any  ultimate  peace,  thou  desirest  the  eternal  recur- 
rence of  war  and  peace — man,  of  thy  self-denial,  wilt  thou 
deny  thyself  all  this  ?    Whence  wilt  thou  gain  the  strength  ?" 

Few  have  had  the  courage  thus  to  face  the  raw 
horror  that  lies  at  the  end  of  the  logic  of  denial,  and 
the  bereavement  which  it  brings.  Against  this  ulti- 
mate woe  rises  the  fact  of  God,  and  because  God  is 
there,  even  when  we  cannot  feel  the  touch  of  His 
great  hand,  we  know  that  purity  is  not  a  delusion, 
that  justice  is  not  a  fiction,  and  that  hope  is  not  a 
dream.  Can  we  know  anything  beyond  the  bare  fact 
that  there  is  a  Power  not  ourselves  which  shapes  our 
ends,  rough-hew  them  how  we  will?  Manifestly! 
Next  to  the  fact  that  God  lives  is  the  faith  that  He 


THE  GOD  OF  COMFORT  123 

cares  for  us,  and  that  all  suffering  com^s  finally  to 
be  endured  by  Him — the  deep  truth  over  which 
Dora  Greenwell  was  wont  to  ponder.  How  can  we 
know  the  sympathy  of  God,  and  that  in  all  our 
afflictions  He  Is  afflicted?  The  flowers  do  not  tell  us 
this  truth.  They  are  as  happy  at  a  funeral  as  on  a 
bridal  altar.  They  do  not  know,  they  do  not  care. 
Nor  do  the  birds  tell  It  to  us,  although  If  It  were 
not  so  it  Is  hard  to  know  why  the  birds  sing.  They 
were  singing  that  day  when  I  witnessed  an  unfor- 
gettable scene  In  Flanders — the  burial  of  two  hun- 
dred men  at  once !  They  did  not  know,  they  did  not 
care.  How  can  we  know  that  there  Is  one  who 
knows,  who  cares,  who  feels  for  us  and  with  us  In  our 
woe? 

Sometime  you  must  go  out  of  your  way.  It  you 
have  not  alreac^y  done  so,  and  study  the  memorial 
to  sweet  Margaret  MacDonald  In  Lincoln's  Inn 
Fields.  She  Is  seated  with  her  arms  outstretched, 
her  robes  so  falling  over  her  arms  as  to  suggest  a 
brooding  mother-bird,  and  underneath  the  hovering 
wings  little  children  nestle  and  play.  Whence  comes 
the  brooding,  hallowing  love  embodied  In  the  life 
of  that  lovely  woman,  whose  Image  recalls  the  atti- 
tude of  the  Master  as  He  wept  over  the  city  of  the 
people  of  his  fathers  ?  That  Is  to  ask.  What  Is  the 
source  of  this  stream  of  pity  which  softens  and 
sweetens  the  world,  seeking  to  melt  the  hardness  of 
Its  winter  Into  the  joy  of  summer?  Is  man  an  exotic 
upon  the  earth?  Or  is  he  a  child  of  nature  and  a 
little  brother  of  the  stars?     What  wells  up  in  his 


124  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

heart  must  be  In  the  heart  of  nature,  else  she  could 
not  give  It  to  her  son.  Thus  when  we  seek  the 
source  of  the  love  that  hallows  human  life  we  find 
its  fountain  in  the  compassionate  heart  of  God, 
whence  It  came  and  to  which  It  returns,  whose  love 
is  the  final  solace  of  the  world.  Here  Is  the  basis  of 
the  faith  that  God  Is  more  than  Power,  more  than 
Mind,  and  that  there  is,  and  must  be,  a  heart  of 
tenderness  behind  the  seeming  hardness  of  life  and 
death. 

Hence  the  words  of  the  Master  as  He  sat  at  table 
with  His  friends  in  the  Upper  Room,  in  which  the 
very  soul  of  His  religion  is  revealed:  "Ye  believe 
In  God,  believe  also  in  Me" — that  is,  believe  that 
God  Is  like  Him,  in  Him,  revealing  Himself  In  and 
through  Him.  What  more  do  we  need  to  know  for 
our  strengthening  and  fortifying,  for  our  support 
and  upholding,  even  in  the  direst  woe  that  can  befall 
us?  If  we  can  be  sure  of  God  in  Christ,  there  Is 
nothing  that  we  cannot  bear!  With  St.  Paul  this 
assurance  was  no  mere  theory,  nor  yet  a  vision,  but 
a  verity  attested  by  those  Inward  reahsatlons  that 
belong  to  the  life  of  faith  and  service.  Here  lay 
the  secret  of  his  triumphant  and  rejoicing  discovery 
of  the  reality,  the  richness,  the  radiance  of  God 
the  Father  of  mercies  and  the  God  of  all  comfort, 
by  whose  grace  he  was  sustained  in  his  private  sor- 
rows and  in  his  heroic  and  dedicated  ministry. 
Hence,  also,  his  Insight  Into  the  purpose  and  uses 
of  comfort,  "That  we  may  be  able  to  comfort  them 


THE  GOD  OF  COMFORT  125 

which  are  in  any  trouble,  by  the  comfort  wherewith 
we  ourselves  are  comforted  of  God." 

Sympathy,  one  feels,  was  not  a  ruling  native  trait 
with  St.  Paul,  as  it  is  with  those  who  hear  always 
"the  great  stream  of  human  tears  falling  through 
the  shadows  of  the  world."  It  was  a  grace  learned 
in  the  school  of  Christ,  and  made  perfect  through 
suffering.  Perhaps  he  found  this  secret  the  more 
surely  just  because  he  did  not  seek  it  selfishly  and 
for  his  own  sorrow  alone.  Nor  should  we.  How- 
ever deeply  wounded  we  may  be,  however  sorely  we 
feel  the  need  of  healing  for  our  own  hurt  and  heart- 
ache, if  we  are  to  find  comfort  in  any  satisfying 
measure  it  must  be  by  ministering  the  comfort  of 
God  to  others.  Here  is  the  finest  of  all  arts,  asking 
for  all  that  a  man  has  of  tact,  of  tenderness,  of 
skill,  and  of  fortitude,  so  difficult  is  it  to  know  what 
to  say  and  how  to  say  it.  All  words  seem  metallic, 
futile,  and  worthless,  yet  we  must  not  be  silent;  much 
less  forget  those  little  tokens  which  help  to  break 
the  awful  stillness  which  death  makes  when  it  passes 
by.  Any  little  token — a  gift  of  flowers,  a  hand- 
clasp, a  tender,  strong  word — is  like  the  answer  to 
a  signal  of  distress,  and  God,  from  whom  it  comes, 
sends  it  through  you  to  His  needy  child. 

Who  that  lives  to-day  does  not  long  for  a  finer 
art  of  sympathy,  some  exquisite  skill  and  power 
whereby  to  lift  wounded  souls  into  the  consecrating 
comfort  of  God!  There  is  not  a  pulpit  in  this  land 
that  does  not  yearn  for  such  a  power,  seeking  it  by 
prayer  and  tears,  beseeching  an  outpouring  of  the 


126  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

Spirit  of  the  Comforter  equal  to  "the  Pentecost  of 
Calamity"  which  has  descended  upon  us.  Oh!  let 
us  seek  the  God  of  all  Comfort  who,  imaged  as  a 
Dove,  broods  over  our  sorrowing  humanity,  that  so 
we  may  be  able  to  comfort  those  who  are  smitten  and 
afflicted  in  a  world  at  war. 

Like  the  dew,   Thy  peace  distil; 
Guide,  subdue  our  wayward  will, 
Things  of  Christ  unfolding  still. 

Comforter  Divine. 
Gentle,  awful,  holy  Guest, 
Make  Thy  temple  in  each  breast ; 
There  Thy  presence  be  confessed. 

Comforter  Divine. 
With  us,  for  us,  intercede. 
And  with  voiceless  groanings  plead 
Our  unutterable  need, 

Comforter  Divine. 


THE  MYSTERY  OF  PAIN 

"Neither  shall  there  be  any  more  pain." — Rev.  xxi.  4. 

SURELY  there  is  not  upon  this  earth  a  book 
more  compassionate,  and  therefore  none  more 
truly  wise,  than  our  great  old  Bible.  It  knows  the 
life  of  man,  how  beset  it  is  with  ills,  and  through 
all  its  pages  there  breathes  a  sweet-toned  pity  that 
is  not  only  haunting  but  healing.  And  of  all  its 
prophecies,  not  one  touches  us  more  deeply  than  this 
vision  of  a  time  when  sorrow  and  suffering  shall 
cease.  It  is  uttered  in  a  few  simple  words,  but  they 
are  among  the  most  beautiful  and  appealing  ever 
written.  Indeed,  it  is  the  only  definite  and  distinct 
prophecy  in  the  Bible  of  the  final  end  of  pain.  There 
is  nothing  else  so  strong,  so  clear,  and  it  is  good  to 
know  that  the  book  which  feels  the  pain  of  Hfe  so 
keenly  sees  to  the  end  of  it. 

Such  an  assurance  is  sorely  needed  in  this  world  at 
all  times,  but  peculiarly  so  just  now  when  the  whole 
earth  is  one  vast  hospital,  and  the  fact  of  pain  is  so 
much  with  us.  Of  course,  the  problem  of  pain  is 
new  only  in  its  magnitude  and  intensity.  Time  out 
of  mind  our  suffering  humanity  has  asked,  of  the 
surrounding  mystery.  Why?  The  contemplation  of 
this  question  produced  Buddhism,  one  of  the  three 
world-religions.    Greek  drama  is  full  of  it.    It  is  the 

127 


128  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

thesis  of  the  book,  of  Job,  the  one  great  poetic  drama 
of  the  Hebrews.  Its  most  perfect  expression,  per- 
haps, is  in  the  line  of  the  Psalmist:  "I  cried  unto 
Thee,  O  Lord,  and  unto  the  Lord  I  made  supplica- 
tion. What  profit  is  there  in  my  blood?"  What  a 
question  in  the  light  of  the  far-flung  battle  line !  To- 
day men  are  acutely  aware  of  the  presence  of  pain, 
and  they  are  troubled  by  it  as  never  before. 

Indeed,  this  was  true  before  the  awful  apocalypse 
of  war  which  has  heightened  everything  and  evoked 
all  the  old  issues  anew.  Along  about  the  middle  of 
the  last  century  the  world  seemed  to  wake  up  to  the 
fact  of  suffering,  and  the  horror  of  it.  Of  a  sudden 
Darwin  put  forth  a  thesis  which  staggered  alike  the 
intellect  and  heart  of  the  race.  It  was  an  appalling 
revelation  of  pain,  of  untold  ages  of  blood  and  terror 
through  which  creation  had  already  passed,  with  a 
new  sense  of  the  place  of  suffering  in  the  order  of 
life.  The  whole  of  nature,  from  a  dewdrop  to  a 
star,  was  seen  to  be  a  battlefield.  Huxley  declared 
that  he  could  imagine  no  sadder  story  than  the  his- 
tory of  sentient  life  upon  the  earth.  War  seemed 
to  be  the  law  of  the  world,  and  suffering  its  life. 
Tennyson  summed  up  the  feeling  in  his  phrase,  "Na- 
ture red  in  tooth  and  claw."  What  this  disclosure 
meant  as  a  shock  to  faith  we  of  this  age  can  hardly 
realise.  Happily,  a  deeper  knowledge  of  nature  has 
brought  us  to  a  better  mood,  but  the  shadow  is  still 
with  us. 

Tender  hearts  there  have  been  in  all  times,  but  it 
seems  agreed  that  the  man  of  to-day  is  more  highly 


THE  MYSTERY  OF  PAIN  129 

organised,  and  therefore  more  sensitive  to  pain,  than 
were  the  men  of  former  times.  When  one  reads  the 
story  of  the  Middle  Ages,  to  go  no  further  back, 
one  is  amazed  equally  by  the  brutality  and  the  cal- 
lousness of  men.  When  a  feudal  magnate  was  sus- 
pected of  treason  to  his  overlord,  all  his  servants 
were  seized  and  tortured  to  death  in  order  to  extract 
evidence  of  his  guilt.  If,  after  the  last  shriek  had 
died  away,  no  evidence  was  forthcoming,  he  was  con- 
gratulated by  his  peers.  No  one  seemed  to  think 
of  the  poor  wretches  who  had  died  in  agony.  King 
James  I.  presided  over  a  case  of  torture  for  witch- 
craft the  details  of  which  are  too  horrible  for  de- 
scription, many  of  which  were  suggested  by  the  king 
himself.  Imagine  the  king  who  reigns  to-day  being 
able  or  willing  to  witness  such  a  scene,  much  less 
enjoy  it!  Marie  Twain  doubted  his  ability  to  see 
even  a  vivisector  vivisected,  because  his  own  feelings 
would  not  allow  him  to  get  all  the  joy  out  of  it  which 
he  felt  he  was  entitled  to. 

Naturally,  then,  owing  to  the  increased  sensitive- 
ness of  the  race,  the  problem  of  pain  in  relation  to 
religious  faith  has  assumed  larger  proportions  in  our 
day.  It  was  not  so  with  our  foreslres.  In  all  their 
elaborate  debates  they  seldom  mention,  much  less 
discuss,  the  question.  Sin  vexed  their  thinking  not 
less  than  their  living,  but  it  did  not  often  occur  to 
them  to  question  the  goodness  of  God  because  of  the 
sufferings  of  the  world,  whereas  with  us  it  is  almost 
the  first  thing  we  think  of.  Much  of  the  scepticism 
of  the  last  century  had  its  sources  in  the  mystery  of 


130  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

pain  pressing  upon  sensitive  hearts.     One  example 
out  of  many  is  the  terrible  indictment  of  the  cruelty 

-4*  of  nature  by  John  Stuart  Mill,  which  is  a  classic. 
Perhaps  it  is  here,  in  a  deep  and  sensitive  heart, 
that  we  must  look  for  the  secret  of  what  has  been 
called,    albeit   not   very   wisely,    the    pessimism    of 

—  Thomas  Hardy.  However  that  may  be,  to-day  in 
many  a  heart  there  is  the  fear  that  our  highest  faiths 
are  too  good  to  be  true  In  presence  of  the  vast  woe 
of  life. 

What  has  Science  to  say  about  the  problem  of 
pain?  For  one  thing,  and  a  very  wise  thing,  it 
warns  us  not  to  read  our  own  sensitive  feelings  back 
into  the  lower  forms  of  life,  as  that  only  exaggerates 
a  mystery  which  is  large  enough  without  being  mag- 
nified; also.  It  reminds  us  that  nature  does  not  waste 
her  methods;  whatever  she  may  do  with  her  ma- 
terials, and  therefore  that  pain  has  a  purpose  and  a 
service  in  the  order  of  things.  Indeed,  It  has  a 
definite  and  benign  purpose  as  a  signal  of  distress 
telling  us  that  something  Is  wrong,  and  must  be  set 
right.  Without  it  the  race  would  have  perished  long 
ago.  Sooner  or  later  every  "v^ng  step,  every  false 
road,  ends  in  pain  and  is  revi^rfed  by  pain.  So  that 
pain,  instead  of  being  a  w^iwon  torture,  is  a  wise 
monitor,  and  even  if  the  sMritual  urge  was  strong 
enough  In  man  to  Iilipel  h^^  upward,  he  would  still 
need  liability  to  pain  to  teach  him  the  right  way. 
Nor  is  that  all.  Science  i'nslsts  that  susceptibility 
to  pain  Is  never  developed  beyond  the  point  where 
it  is  needed,  and  when  it  has  served  its  end  it  ceases. 


THE  MYSTERY  OF  PAIN  131 

Such  teaching  Is  worth  keeping  In  mind  and  thinking 
about. 

If  sensitiveness  to  pain  Is  never  developed  where  it 
Is  not  needed,  It  must  be  that  the  Increased  sensi- 
tiveness to  It  In  our  age  Is  needed  for  the  nurture 
of  qualities  not  otherwise  to  be  acquired.  Surely 
this  Is  a  ray  of  light;  and  also,  since  pain  ceases 
when  it  has  done  its  work,  we  have  a  hint  of  why  It 
still  exists  and  a  prophecy  of  the  time  when  It  will 
be  no  more.  Pain  is  useful  as  a  protection,  as  a  pun- 
ishment for  past  folly,  as  a  spur  to  new  effort,  and  as 
a  warning  against  future  error.  So  far — and  It  Is 
not  very  far — the  way  is  clear;  but  when  we  think 
of  the  seemingly  needless  tortures  of  the  Innocent, 
and  the  apparently  gratuitously  agonising  forms  of 
pain,  we  are  oppressed.  There  remains  a  mystery 
into  which  we  catinot  fully  enter,  as  Benson  taught  us 
in  "The  Angel  of  Pain,"  a  study  In  symbolism 
shadowing  forth  many  things.  Merival  in  that  story 
is  a  hermit  who  left  London  to  live  with  nature,  and 
the  longer  he  lived  with  nature,  and  the  longer  he 
lived  in  the  wild  the  more  he  became  aware  of  mys- 
teries he  could  not  solve.  Faint  and  far  off  he  hears 
the  pipes  of  Pan  placing  the  Hymn  of  All  Things, 
and  he  knows  that  n(^'mortal  can  behold  Pan  without 
dying  of  panic.  Stljr,  he  dreams  that  Pan  will  come 
to  him,  revealing  in  a  blinding  flash  of  joy  how  pain 
and  death,  which  are  everywhere,  are  a  part  of  the 
divine  perfection.  Whether  this  was  what  he  learned 
or  not,  nobody  knows ;  for  his  friend,  hearing  a  ter- 
rible cry  in  the,  night,  ran  to  him  and  found  him  dead 


132  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

— whether  of  too  much  joy  or  too  much  sorrow,  no 
one  knew. 

Nevertheless,  we  are  not  left  without  light,  and 
it  may  be  doubted  if  any  one  has  written  of  "The 
Mystery  of  Pain"  with  more  insight  and  wisdom 
than  James  Hinton,  an  English  physician  born  in 
Reading  well-nigh  a  hundred  years  ago.  The  man 
himself  is  of  interest,  not  only  for  his  service  as  a 
man  of  science  but  for  the  seerlike  quality  of  his 
mind.  He  was  a  medical  mystic.  Those  who  knew 
him  intimately  write  of  him  with  unusual  rever- 
ence, as  of  a  man  in  whom  there  was  a  haunting 
loveliness  not  often  seen.  His  essay  in  study  of  Pain 
is  rather  hard  to  read,  but  it  is  rewarding.  Its  mes- 
sage to  the  sufferer  may  be  stated  briefly:  "My 
thought  was  that  all  which  we  feel  as  painful  is  really 
giving  something  that  our  fellows  are  better  for, 
even  though  we  cannot  trace  it."  There  are  many 
facts  to  show  that  suffering  has  a  value  beyond  the 
sufferer,  as  when  a  mother  suffers  for  her  child,  a 
martyr  for  his  faith,  a  hero  for  his  country;  and 
these  facts,  he  holds,  justify  a  like  faith  in  instances 
where  no  such  value  can  be  traced.  Much  depends, 
of  course,  on  the  way  in  which  we  bear  pain,  whether 
selfishly  or  not,  since  we  have  within  us  the  power 
to  transfigure  it  if  we  will.  That  is  to  say.  Pain, 
plus  unselfishness,  equals  joy.  Hinton  does  not  ex- 
plain all  the  mystery  of  pain — no  mortal  can — ^but  he 
does  make  It  more  bearable  by  showing  how  it  may 
be  turned  into  good  for  ourselves  and  for  others. 

Some  of  us  may  have  known  much  of  pain,  but 


THE  MYSTERY  OF  PAIN  133 

most  of  us  are  standing  outside  the  problem,  talking 
about  it,  fearful  of  it,  sometimes  whining  about  it. 
When  we  appeal  from  our  own  sensitiveness  to  the 
lives  of  the  great  sufferers,  wonderful  is  the  answer 
that  comes  back.  Oddly  enough,  the  great  sufferers 
have  been,  for  the  most  part,  the  great  believers. 
With  them  pain  is  a  fact  in  favour  of  faith.  They 
find  a  secret,  unguessed  joy  at  the  heart  of  pain, 
which,  as  George  Eliot  said,  "we  can  only  tell  from 
pain  by  its  being  what  we  should  choose  before  every- 
thing." Such  is  the  testimony  of  a  host  of  heroic 
souls.  Stevenson  was  one;  Elizabeth  Browning  was 
another,  and  she  never  regretted  having  learned  in 
suffering  what  she  taught  in  song.  Anguish  instructed 
her  in  joy,  and  solitude  in  the  value  of  society.  The 
great  sufferers  do  not  deny  pain — still  less  seek  it — 
but  they  master 'it,  making  it  serve  for  the  enrichment 
of  the  soul;  and  therein  they  are  wise.  For  progress 
is  not  going  to  abolish  suffering;  it  is  inherent  in  the 
discord  between  sense  and  soul,  dream  and  deed. 
Therefore  if  it  falls  to  our  lot  let  us  face  it  and 
vanquish  it,  finding  in  it  something  sacrificial  both 
for  ourselves  and  for  the  world. 

No  one  ever  stated  the  ministry  of  pain  more 
vividly  than  did  that  mysterious  Era  Ugo  Bassi,  who 
appeared  in  the  streets  of  Rome  in  the  early  years  of 
the  last  century.  He  was  master  of  a  strange  elo- 
quence which  stirred  men  deeply.  When  he  spoke 
of  courage  men  followed  him  straight  into  the 
cholera  hospitals  and  stayed  there  until  the  plague 
was  ended.     All  that  remains  of  his  life  is  a  frag- 


134  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

ment  of  sermon  in  a  hospital  to  those  smitten  with 
mortal  ill.  Fra  Ugo  took  for  his  text,  "I  am  the 
vine,  and  ye  are  the  branches."  He  showed  how  the 
vine  does  not  grow  as  it  wills,  but  is  tied  to  a  stake 
like  a  martyr.  When  it  begins  to  feel  the  sweetness 
of  life,  then  comes  the  husbandman  with  his  pruning- 
hook,  leaving  it  bleeding  and  sore.  At  last  comes  the 
vintage,  and  out  of  its  suffering  and  striving  red  rivu- 
lets of  wine  flow  to  bless  and  to  refresh.  Then  the 
preacher  turned  to  the  long  rows  of  hospital  beds  on 
either  side,  and  asked,  "Do  I  need  to  draw  the  lesson 
of  this  life?"  Manifestly  not,  since  it  is  as  plain  as 
day,  and  attested  by  the  facts  in  every  field  of  life, 
that  "whoso  suffers  most  hath  most  to  give."  The 
Roman  Church,  with  its  deep  insight  into  the  saying 
of  St.  Paul,  "I  fill  up  that  which  is  behind  in  the 
afflictions  of  Christ,"  discovers  in  pain  a  power  which 
in  the  extent  of  its  working  can  be  but  dimly  guessed 
at;  a  mighty  power  of  expiation  ever  joining  itself 
to  the  one  Atonement — inseparable,  indeed,  from 
that  Atonement,  which  has  given  value  to  all  suffer- 
ing so  that  not  even  a  moth  is  "shrlvell'd  In  a  fruit- 
less fire."  Lacordaire,  in  words  that  do  not  at  once 
reveal  their  awful  depth  of  meaning,  speaks  of  the 
mute  and  many  sufferers  of  earth  as  being  "the  ob- 
scure victims  of  the  Cross  which  has  saved  them." 
Deeper  than  that  we  cannot  go  Into  the  mystery 
of  pain.  The  revelation  of  our  religion  was  made 
through  it.  When  we  look  upon  the  Cross  we  know 
for  a  brief  time  that  the  turbid  ebb  and  flow  of 
human  misery  is  not  meaningless.    There  is  One  who 


THE  MYSTERY  OF  PAIN  135 

knows,  One  who  feels,  One  who  suffers  with  us  in  our 
pain;  and  of  this  faith  was  born  the  vision  of  the 
Christian  seer  on  the  isle  that  is  called  Patmos: 
"And  God  Himself  shall  wipe  away  all  tears  from 
their  eyes;  and  there  shall  be  no  more  death,  neither 
sorrow  nor  crying,  neither  shall  there  be  any  more 
pain;  for  the  former  things  are  passed  away." 


THE  COMPASSION  OF  CHRIST 

"And  Jesus  saw  much  people,   and  was  moved  with  com- 
passion toward  them." — Mark  vi.  34. 

NOTHING  Is  more  Interesting  than  a  crowd. 
It  attracts  us,  not  from  curiosity  alone,  but 
because  we  love  the  company  of  our  kind  and  the  joy 
that  comes  of  sharing  our  feelings  with  our  fellows. 
Often  I  go  out  Into  a  London  street  just  to  watch 
the  endless  flow  of  people,  and  people,  and  people. 
I  know  none  of  them,  yet  I  know  them  all,  for  are 
they  not  my  kith  and  kin,  with  hopes  and  fears  and 
faiths  like,  my  own?  I  am  won  by  some  and  re- 
pelled by  others  for  what  their  faces  seem  to  tell 
me  of  their  Inward  selves — faces  that  are  like 
glimpses  of  a  landscape  In  the  mist,  suggesting  hid- 
den vales  and  hills.  And  there  they  are,  all  trying 
to  go  somewhere,  to  do  somewhat,  to  escape  from 
something  or  other,  or  seeking  that  which  Is  to  be 
found  In  this  world  in  no  satisfying  quantity  or  qual- 
ity. If  at  all. 

No  matter  how  carelessly  or  indifferently  or 
humorously  one  enters  a  crowd.  If  he  be  a  thoughtful 
man,  he  will  soon  be  watching  It  broodingly.  There 
are  faces  that  tell  a  tale  of  evil  or  suffering,  cheeks 
scarred  by  sorrow  or  sin,  betraying  the  deep-lying 
pathos  of  life  which  perhaps  the  sufferers  have  come 

136 


THE  COMPASSION  OF  CHRIST  137 

out  into  the  crowded  place  to  forget.  Thus  a  crowd 
touches  us,  doubly  so  for  me  at  least,  when  I  see  it  by 
a  seaside,  against  the  grey  background  of  old  ocean 
that  whispers,  or  thunders,  or  shdes  and  slithers, 
or  tumbles  and  crashes  on  the  beach.  The  multi- 
tude will  pass  and  vanish,  but  the  grey  sea  stays,  and 
will  swallow  them  all  back  whence  they  came.  Now 
it  is  ferocious,  now  felinely  friendly,  yet  we  need  not 
be  afraid  of  it,  because  it  is  of  kin  to  us,  restless 
as  our  souls  are  restless. 

Thoughts  such  as  these  help  us  to  interpret  the 
text  and  the  Gospel  of  Mark,  from  which  it  is  laken, 
not  inaptly  called  the  Gospel  of  the  Multitude.  To 
read  this  book,  the  briefest  and  boldest  of  the  four 
Gospels,  is  to  look  out  over  vast  crowds  of  men  and 
women,  to  hear  the  tramp,  tramp  of  thousands  of 
feet  and  the  corlfused  murmur  of  myriads  of  voices. 
Now  a  crowd  affects  people  differently;  some  are 
amused  by  it,  some  disgusted,  some  entertained,  some 
wearied,  some  harassed — but  the  writer  of  this  Gos- 
pel tells  us  how  Jesus  felt  toward  a  crowd.  The 
words  have  all  the  marks  of  an  eyewitness  who  had 
watched  the  Master  when  He  was  surrounded  by  a 
throng,  and  found  His  face  more  fascinating  than 
the  multitude,  seeing  it  touched  and  lighted  by  an 
all-pitying,  ineffable,  yearning  gentleness;  and  he 
never  forgot  that  expression.  If  only  some  artist 
could  have  painted  that  face  when  He  was  deeply 
touched  by  the  presence  of  a  multitude,  it  would 
help  us  to  know  how  an  Eternal  Love  looks  upon 
our  pilgrim  human  race. 


138  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

Jesus  looked  upon  a  crowd,  not  with  indifference, 
not  with  contempt,  not  with  mere  curiosity,  but  with 
an  exquisite  and  moving  compassion.  He  saw  the 
joys  of  men  and  women,  their  follies,  their  ways  and 
habits,  as  His  parables  reveal;  but  His  deepest  con- 
cern must  have  been  to  discern  the  work  of  God  in 
their  hearts — a  work  always  going  on,  always  im- 
portant, as  various  as  the  infinite  varieties  of  man, 
as  urgent  as  their  need,  as  continuing  as  the  return 
of  night  and  day.  We  talk  of  the  crowd,  but  there 
are  no  indistinguishable  masses  of  men  in  the  thought 
of  God.  He  sees  you  and  me,  every  man,  woman 
and  little  child,  as  an  individual  pupil  In  His  school 
of  life.  What  we  can  only  guess  at  as  we  look  into 
the  faces,  not  of  strangers  only,  but  of  the  members 
of  our  own  household.  He  knows  down  to  the  bot- 
tom of  the  soul.  There  are  no  strangers  to  the  heart 
of  God,  no  outcasts  to  His  mercy,  save  such  as  would 
make  themselves  castaways  if  they  could — lost  to 
themselves,  but  not  lost  to  Him.  Perhaps  we  make 
a  mistake  when  we  lump  together  the  ways  of  God 
with  men  under  one  vast  word.  Providence,  when  we 
should  use  a  more  personal  word,  as  Jesus  did,  con- 
fident that  He  loves  each  one  with  a  love  founded 
on  a  knowledge  that  embraces  all  that  live. 

Now,  compassion  lies  at  the  root  of  all  noble  re- 
ligion, the  pity  of  God  for  man  and  of  man  for  man. 
The  chapters  of  the  Koran,  all  of  them,  begin  with 
the  words:  "In  the  name  of  God,  the  compassion- 
ate, the  merciful."  The  noble  religion  of  Buddha 
numbers  five  hundred  million  votaries,  and  pity  is  the 


THE  COMPASSION  OF  CHRIST         139 

keynote  of  it  all — pity  for  man  bound  to  the  Wheel 
of  Life,  distracted  by  desire,  restless,  unhappy.  So 
the  compassion  of  Christ,  so  profound,  so  haunting, 
so  healing,  showed  that  He  stood  in  the  sublime 
tradition  of  those  who  feel  for  man  and  seek  to  lead 
him,  as  Good  Shepherds,  thither  where  He  seeks 
to  go.  More  than  sympathy,  more  than  pity,  com- 
passion enters  into  the  very  soul  of  humanity,  feels 
what  it  feels,  knows  its  yearnings,  its  perplexities, 
even  the  agony  of  its  sin,  and  understands  while  it 
blesses;  understands  not  only  the  facts  but  the  causes. 
It  is  love  at  its  highest,  its  deepest,  its  purest,  as 
Balzac  has  shown  in  The  Alchemist. 

There  is,  however,  a  deep  difference  between  Jesus 
and  Buddha.  If  Buddha  pitied  men  because  they 
live,  tormented  by  the  fever  of  desires  that  can 
never  be  realised — and  vain  when  realised — Jesus 
was  moved  with  compassion  because  they  do  not 
really  live.  Life  to  Jesus  was  so  wonderful  beyond 
words,  so  deep,  so  full  of  divine  meanings,  and 
withal  so  close  at  hand,  that  He  pitied  the  blindness 
that  did  not  see  it  and  the  sin  that  defiled  it.  The 
people  thronged  about  Him  with  their  hungry  hearts, 
their  bewildered  minds,  their  despairing  hopes  of  this 
world  and  that  to  come,  their  sorrows,  their  weari- 
ness, their  life-sapping  diseases,  and  His  heart  went 
out  in  a  tide  of  pity.  He  saw  them  wandering,  for- 
lorn, in  a  world  full  of  the  love  and  truth  of  God, 
harassed  by  fears  of  life,  fear  of  death,  fear  of  God, 
fear  of  the  unexplained  mystery  of  the  future,  and 
it  touched  Him  to  tears.    Da  Vinci  has  shown  us  a 


140  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

Christ  too  much  burdened  by  His  own  tragedy;  but 
when  the  perfect  artist  has  come,  he  will  portray  a 
sympathising  Christ,  a  ministering  Christ — a  face 
with  the  finest  lines  of  sensibility  and  eyes  of  fathom- 
less, unutterable  pity. 

With  us,  alas,  pity  is  so  helpless,  but  not  so  the 
compassion  of  Christ.  It  is  creative.  Deeper  than 
sin,  deeper  than  its  deadening  power.  He  saw  some- 
thing divine  in  every  man,  something  struggling  up- 
wards seeking  the  sunlight;  and  that  precious  thing 
He  sought  to  reach — willing  to  forgive  anything  if 
only  He  could  touch  it  to  new  life  and  hope.  So  He 
sees  us  still,  sees  that  in  the  sinner  of  which  the  sinner 
is  unconscious,  or  only  vaguely  aware;  sees  us  as 
heirs  of  a  life  which  is  not  yet  ours — dreams  of  us 
as  we  are  to  be,  imputes  to  us  a  beauty  not  yet  our 
own.  And  thus,  by  His  compassion.  He  creates 
within  us  a  new  spirit  which  blooms  in  new  desires 
and  aims  and  endeavours,  and  works  out  our  salva- 
tion with  us,  both  to  will  and  to  do.  Down  to  the 
lowest  depths  His  compassion  goes,  feeling  the 
misery  of  sin  even  when  the  sinner  does  not  feel  it, 
knowing  how  it  came  to  be,  through  some  defect  of 
will,  some  heat  of  passion,  some  desire  perverted  by 
self-will,  some  dulness  of  soul;  knows  it  all  and 
makes  it  His  cross  until  we  are  redeemed  from  it. 

Surely  such  compassion  is  a  revelation  of  God, 
whose  mercy  endureth  for  ever.  There  is  a  famous 
painting  by  a  Flemish  artist,  Leomprels,  entitled 
"Humanity  and  Destiny,"  in  which  we  are  shown  the 
human     multitudes     with     hands     uplifted — some 


THE  COMPASSION  OF  CHRIST         141 

knotted  with  toil,  some  bejewelled,  some  emaciated 
with  ill-health,  old  hands  blue-veined  and  trembling, 
hands  young  and  strong,  some  uplifted  in  prayer, 
same  waving  red  flags,  lovers'  hands  clasped,  moth- 
ers lifting  the  chubby  hands  of  children,  seeking 
blessings.  And  when  we  look  up  to  where  the  hands 
are  reaching  we  see  a  benign  face  in  the  sky,  from 
which  radiates  the  light  that  warms  and  blesses.  It 
is  the  face  of  God  the  Father  of  men,  whose  com- 
passion never  faileth.  Humanity  now,  humanity  for 
ever,  is  in  the  keeping  of  One  most  truly  revealed  in 
Him  who  went  about  doing  good,  laying  His  hand 
upon  us  in  sickness,  His  fingers  upon  our  eyes,  breath- 
ing His  blessing  upon  us,  taking  us  by  the  hand  as 
we  sink,  entering  our  homes,  coohng  our  fever,  teach- 
ing, chiding,  enfolding,  upholding,  inviting,  encour- 
aging, drawing,  controlling,  commanding.  So  that 
when  we  think  of  God  and  wonder  what  He  Is,  it 
always  comes  back  to  our  thinking  of  Jesus  infinitely 
enlarged  in  every  way. 

Of  course,  this  is  no  new  Gospel  in  the  City  Tem- 
ple. The  founder  and  first  minister  of  this  church 
was  a  noble  preacher  of  the  Compassion  of  Christ, 
as  his  venerable  expounder  has  recalled  to  our  minds 
in  a  fruitful  and  rewarding  book.^  He  was  deeply 
moved  by  the  Greek  word  used  by  St.  Paul  to  de- 
scribe Christ,  the  Great  High  Priest,  and  rendered 
"who  can  have  compassion,"  finding  in  it  the  foun- 
dations on  which  this  Temple  rests.  In  exegesis  of 
that  Greek  word,  he  said,  preaching  to  the  City 

'  The  spiritual  Life,  by  Alexander  Whyte. 


142  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

Temple    congregation    in    1640,    preaching    in    his 
searching  and  deep-probing  manner: 

"This  Greek  word  is  exceedingly  emphatical.  It  means 
much  more  than  the  English  rendering  'who  can  have  com- 
passion,' means.  For  when  this  great  Greek  word  of  the 
Apostle  is  rightly  rendered  and  rightly  laid  to  heart,  it  re- 
veals to  us  that  Jesus  Christ,  our  great  High  Priest,  not  only 
has  a  great  compassion  in  His  heart,  but  that  He  has  a  spe- 
cial and  a  particular  compassion  measured  out  according  to 
every  individual  man's  measure  of  need,  according  to  every 
individual  man's  specialty,  and  particularity,  and  singularity, 
and  secrecy  of  need.  ...  I  need  my  great  High  Priest  to 
have  not  only  all  the  abilities  and  all  the  attributes  and  all 
the  great  qualifications  that  you  need  in  Him,  but,  over  and 
above  all  that,  I,  Thomas  Goodwin,  your  minister,  need  Him 
always  urgently  and,  indeed,  sometimes  absolutely  agonis- 
ingly, for  certain  special  and  secret  and  altogether  individual 
needs  of  my  own;  needs  of  my  own  that  no  other  mortal 
man  knows  anything  about,  nor  would  believe  even  if  I  con- 
fessed them  to  him;  needs  of  my  own  that  are  so  excep- 
tionally and  so  exclusively  my  own  that  no  other  man  be- 
fore me,  or  now  around  me,  or  coming  after  me,  will  ever 
have  needs  exactly  like  them.  It  is  absolutely  inconceivable 
to  me  that  any  other  man,  past,  present,  or  to  come,  could 
ever  have  just  that  combination  and  just  that  concentration 
and  just  that  incidence  of  sin  and  sorrow  that  I  have,  to- 
gether with  all  the  temporal  and  spiritual  intricacies  of  all 
kinds,  of  which  both  my  heart  and  my  life  are  brimful.  No 
other  man  in  all  this  sinful  and  sorrowful  city  of  London 
has  just  my  crosses  and  cups  and  thorns  in  the  flesh.  Not 
one  man  of  you  all." 


THE  COMPASSION  OF  CHRIST  143 

So  Goodwin  spoke,  in  his  great  home-coming  way, 
in  the  long  ago ;  and  his  words  come  back  to  us  across 
the  years,  telling  what  every  minister  of  the  City 
Temple  must  have  felt.  But  the  compassion  of 
Christ  is  equal  to  all  our  temporal  needs,  all  our  im- 
mortal longings,  all  that  we  can  think  or  feel  or  suf- 
fer, if  we,  like  our  first  minister,  "believe  that  it  is 
so."  Not  one  of  us  but  feels  that  we  have  needs  as 
unique  and  individual  as  his,  separating  us  from  all 
others;  but  the  love  of  God  in  Christ  can  find  its  way 
into  our  lonely  isolation,  and  heal  us.  There  was  a 
woman  in  a  George  Eliot  story  who  was  unhappy 
when  dying,  not  because  she  was  dying,  but  because 
she  feared  her  husband  would  not  find  the  key  to 
the  blue  closet  upstairs.  Every  one  of  us  has  a  Blue 
Closet  in  his  heart.  No  one  knows  what  is  hidden 
there,  and  we  take  the  key  with  us  when  we  go  away. 
But  God  knows,  and  the  compassion  of  Christ  can 
reach  even  to  that  lonely  corner  of  the  heart  and 
cleanse  it,  driving  out  the  grey  shadows  that  linger 
there.     O  my  soul  remember! 

Pity  is  the  quality  which  most  deeply  touches  man, 
because  it  the  most  resembles  God.  How  wonderful 
is  the  pity  of  Shakespeare,  a  pity  that  reaches  beyond 
man  and  touches  nature!  It  fills  with  its  flood  of 
light  the  whole  expanse  of  his  works,  and  is  perhaps 
what  makes  them  so  living  and  healing.  Even  the 
characters  that  least  deserve  It  receive  it  without 
stint,  because  it  Is  the  very  spirit  of  his  genius.  At 
last  all  rancour  is  obliterated,  all  sin  forgiven.  The 
last  word  which  hovers  over  the  final  chord  of  his 


144  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

symphony  is  that  of  the  luminous  Spirit  of  the  Air, 
with  which  Ariel  inspires  Prospero: 

The  rare  action  is 
In  virtue  than  in  vengeance. 

Here  is  the  token  of  true  greatness  of  soul.  As 
Emerson  said  of  Lincoln,  "his  heart  was  as  great  as 
the  world,  but  there  was  no  room  in  it  for  the  mem- 
ory of  a  wrong."  Such  words  make  real  to  us  the 
magnanimity  and  compassion  of  Jesus,  which 
reached  its  highest  glory  in  that  sublimest  of  all  pray- 
ers which  embraced  His  enemies;  "Father,  forgive 
them;  for  they  know  not  what  they  do." 

Even  so,  because  we  are  followers  of  the  compas- 
sionate Christ  we  must  be  compassionate  one  toward 
another,  even  toward  our  enemies  in  their  madness 
and  shame.  Whatever  may  be  our  theology,  or  our 
lack  of  it,  unless  we  have  the  spirit  of  Christ  we 
are  none  of  His.  God  help  us !  He  knows  what  un- 
utterable things  we  have  suffered  and  what  feelings 
are  in  our  hearts!  He  knows  that  we  are  human, 
and  if  we  cannot  all  at  once  forgive,  much  less  for- 
get, He  will  grant  us  the  compassion  to  which  we 
are  unable  to  attain,  and  teach  us  how  to  win  love 
out  of  hate  and  good  out  of  infinite  pain.  Time  will 
help  to  heal,  for  the  longer  one  lives  in  this  world 
the  more  does  love  and  pity  increase  and  attachment 
to  party  or  opinion  decrease.  Yet,  in  the  long  last, 
both  friend  and  foe  alike  will  be  drawn  together  and 
healed  by  the  spirit  of  Him  who,  when  He  saw  the 
multitude,  was  moved  with  compassion. 


THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SAINTS 

"The  sword  of  the   Spirit,  which  is  the  word  of  God." — 

Eph.  vi.  17. 

"It  came  to  pass,  when  Moses  held  up  his  hand,  that  Israel 

prevailed." — ^Ex.  xvii.  11. 

THERE  is  no  doubt  that  we  are  now  at  a  grave 
and  critical  issue  of  world  affairs/  and  every 
man  among  us  must  be  subdued  and  thoughtful. 
Whatever  his  faith  or  unfaith,  it  is  hard  to  imagine 
any  man  with  heart  unbowed.  It  is  one  of  those 
times  which  sometimes  befall  when  men  stand  so  near 
the  veil  of  the  Unseen  that  they  can  almost  hear  the 
beating  of  an  Infinite  Heart.  The  magnitude  of 
the  issues  involved,  the  awful  sacrifice  required,  the 
agony  of  suspense  as  the  battle  sways  to  and  fro, 
send  us  to  our  knees.  There  is  no  need  to  tell  men 
to  pray ;  they  simply  have  to  pray,  else  their  hearts 
will  break  from  sheer  weight  of  sorrow  and  anxiety. 
The  call  to  prayer  comes  not  half  so  imperatively 
from  the  pulpit  as  from  the  human  heart  itself,  torn 
by  the  anguish  and  stress  of  tragedy.  Such  a  time  is 
a  great  moral  revelation,  when  little  things  are  swept 
aside  and  the  real  voice  of  humanity  is  heard.    These 

*  Preached  during  the  great  enemy  oflFensive  in  April  1918, 
an  ordeal  no  one  will  ever  forget.  London  was  tongue-tied; 
men  looked  on  one  another  and  understood.  It  revealed  at 
once  the  heroic  quality  of  a  great  race  and  the  practical  value 
of  the  power  of  prayer  to  fortify  and  sustain. 

145 


146  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

are  days  when  we  must  gather  up  our  final  reasons 
for  holding  on  in  the  battle  of  life,  when  for  com- 
fort, for  courage,  and  for  endurance  we  need  the 
succour  and  support  of  the  Eternal. 

Nay,  more.  The  hour  has  come  when  we  must  not 
only  pray,  but  must  be  prepared  to  make  the  sac- 
rifices and  take  the  ventures  of  faith  which  real 
prayer  involves.  It  is  no  time  for  panic,  but  for 
quiet  and  profound  prayer,  both  personal  and  cor- 
porate, the  fruit  of  which  is  effort-producing  faith 
and  a  more  adequate  insight  into  the  will  of  God. 
The  question  is  not  whether  God  is  on  our  side,  but 
whether,  as  Lincoln  said  in  a  dark  hour,  we  are 
worthy  to  be  on  His  side;  whether  we  are  fit  instru- 
ments for  the  service  of  His  purpose.  Moses  on 
the  Mount,  and  Aaron  and  Hur  upholding  his  hands 
of  supplication  while  the  battle  ebbed  and  flowed 
in  the  valley  beneath,  is  the  picture  that  comes  back 
to  mind.  What  influence  prayer  may  have  upon  the 
course  and  issue  of  events  no  one  knows;  but  the 
experience  of  Lincoln  just  before  and  during  the 
battle  of  Gettysburg,  upon  which  the  fate  of  a  nation 
hung,  must  not  be  forgotten.  As  far  removed  from 
the  stories  of  answered  prayer  to  which  we  often 
listen  as  from  the  crude  rationalism  that  denies  them, 
it  fills  one  with  awe. 

This  at  least  is  true:  only  the  mighty  grace  of 
God  is  equal  to  an  hour  like  this,  when  the  faith 
of  men  is  tried  as  if  by  fire.  By  the  same  token,  it 
ought  to  be  a  time  of  great  discoveries  of  the  reality 
and  adequacy  of  the  Grace  of  God  and  the  funda- 


THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SAINTS  147 

mental  assurances  of  our  faith.  A  shadow  of  mys- 
tery and  awe  is  upon  us.  To-day,  in  the  presence 
of  an  unparalleled  ordeal,  we  have  an  opportunity 
to  make  trial  of  those  forces  of  the  spirit  which  we 
have  not  enough  considered;  and  if  it  evokes  in  us  a 
new  sense  alike  of  the  power  of  prayer  and  of  the 
hitherto  unguessed  resources  of  the  soul,  it  will  not 
have  been  in  vain.  Unless  something  fair  and  fine 
is  won  from  it,  enriching  the  times  to  be,  surely  we 
have  not  met  it  in  the  right  way.  For,  to  go  no  fur- 
ther, there  are  forces  at  our  command,  if  we  are 
willing  and  worthy  to  use  them,  which  will  turn 
tragedy  into  triumph,  making  us  victors  over  doubt 
and  dismay  and  masters  of  whatever  may  befall  us 
in  the  fluctuating  fortunes  of  war.  Unimagined  dis- 
closures await  us  if  we  actually  give  ourselves  up  to 
the  Divine  Spirit  to  learn  what  He  would  have  us  be, 
knowing  that  the  secret  of  being  Divinely  led  is  the 
willingness  to  follow  and  obey. 

When  we  look  below  the  surface,  the  real  question 
is  not.  Why  should  men  pray,  but  why  do  they  pray? 
All  men  do  pray,  because  it  is  a  necessity  of  their 
nature,  an  instinct  of  the  soul,  like  the  homing  in- 
stinct of  a  bird.  Here  at  our  disposal  is  a  mighty 
force,  a  law  of^the  life  of  man,  the  meaning  and  uses 
of  which  we  have  hardly  begun  to  discover — the 
power  of  prayer.  It  is  what  Francis  Thompson 
called  "the  sword  of  the  saints";  but  just  as  a  sword 
is  made  of  metal  dug  from  the  earth,  melted,  tem- 
pered and  polished,  so  this  instinct  of  prayer  must 
be  interpreted  by  spiritual  intelligence,  trained,  puri- 


148  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

fied,  and  applied  to  the  uses  of  life  and  character. 
Men  will  not  long  continue  in  prayer  unless  they  have 
a  vivid  sense  of  its  value  and  relevancy;  and  for  that 
reason  we  must  not  talk  of  prayer  as  if  it  were  made 
up  of  pious  hopes  and  good  wishes,  forgetting  the 
law  of  its  nature  and  the  discipline  of  its  use. 

To-day  my  design  is  to  pass  over  briefly  the  sim- 
pler forms  of  prayer,  that  so  we  may  climb  up  the 
ladder  toward  that  highest  form  of  fellowship  with 
the  Eternal  Will,  which  is  alone  equal  to  this  awful 
time.  What  are  the  benefits  of  prayer?  Chiefly 
two,  according  to  the  usual  report,  the  first  being 
the  reflex  influence  upon  the  man  who  prays.  As 
Meredith  said,  "Who  rises  from  prayer  a  better 
man,  his  prayer  is  answered,"  and  it  is  a  fact  that 
the  man  who  truly  prays  does  rise  a  better  man. 
Prayer  does  quiet  the  spirit,  clarify  the  mind,  and 
purify  the  heart.  It  does  exalt  and  sustain  us,  evok- 
ing hitherto  unguessed  resources  of  the  soul,  not  only 
resting  us  from  fret  and  fear,  but  reinforcing  us 
when  we  are  faint  and  weary.  So  much  even  the 
psychologist  admits;  but  prayer  is  able  to  do  this 
because  we  believe  it  to  be  something  more  than  a 
musing  with  ourselves,  more  than  communion  with 
our  higher  self.  Indeed  no  one  would  pray  very 
long  if  he  did  not  think  that  it  is  more  than  a  mere 
psychological  exercise,  for  it  is  our  higher  self  which 
most  needs  to  be  fortified. 

That  is  to  say,  prayer  in  its  deeper  aspect  and  as- 
piration is  communion  with  Another  not  ourselves 
in  whose  fellowship  the  soul  is  renewed  and  fortified 


THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SAINTS  149 

and  exalted.  For  the  Christian  at  least  it  is  com- 
munion, not  with  a  world-force,  but  with  a  world- 
Father;  and  as  we  know  what  it  is  to  hold  fellow- 
ship with  good  men  and  women,  to  breathe  their 
aspirations,  to  learn  to  love  what  they  love,  so  we 
can  think  what  it  means  to  commune  with  God,  to 
yield  ourselves  to  His  desires,  and  to  love  what  He 
loves.  Prayer  may  take  as  many  forms  as  men  have 
moods — petition,  confession,  adoration,  or  "a  wish 
directed  heavenward,"  as  Phillips  Brooks  used  to 
call  it — but  no  Christian  prays  simply  to  tell  God 
what  he  wants,  but  because  he  knows  that  God 
knoweth  what  things  he  has  need  of  better  than  he 
knows  himself.  He  prays  for  the  joy,  and  some- 
times the  pain,  of  pouring  out  his  heart  to  the  Father 
of  all.  His  prayer  is  not  so  much  for  gifts  as  for 
communion  with  the  Giver  of  all  Good,  desire  of  His 
blessing,  petition  for  His  presence,  and  submission 
to  His  will. 

But  it  is  with  prayer  in  another  dimension  that 
we  have  now  to  do — prayer  in  its  dynamic  aspect. 
The  will  of  God  is  complete,  active,  inevitable,  but 
prayer  is  much  more  than  mere  submission  to  it. 
Indeed,  it  is  possible  to  pray,  "Not  my  will,  but 
Thine,  be  done,"  and  miss  the  high  meaning  and 
opportunity  of  the  words;  as  if  we  asked  God  to 
put  our  will  aside  and  let  His  will  be  done  in  spite 
of  us.  No,  no;  He  does  not  ask  such  dumb,  abject 
submission.  What  He  asks  is  that  we  make  room 
in  our  hearts  and  lives  for  His  will  to  act,  yielding 
ourselves  to  its  pressure,  its  passage,  its  movement. 


150  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

Of  course,  this  means  identifying  our  affections  and 
purposes  with  His  high  ends,  even  when  those  ends 
cut  straight  across  all  our  wishes,  as  they  sometimes 
do.  Sometimes;  but  not  always.  Once  we  have 
learned  to  give  free  way  to  the  divine  will,  no  longer 
obstructing  it,  so  that  it  may  enter,  possess,  and  use 
us,  there  is  no  conflict.  Then  we  discover  the  great- 
est of  all  truths;  that  the  will  of  God  and  the  high- 
est good  of  man  are  one  and  eternally  inseparable, 
and  that  spiritual  advance  and  conquest  can  come 
only  when  men  dedicate  themselves  to  spiritual 
values. 

Submission  does  not  describe  such  an  attitude  and 
achievement.  When  we  pray  after  this  manner  we 
do  more  than  submit  to  the  will  of  God;  we  ener- 
getically lift  ourselves  up  to  identify  our  lives  with 
it,  gathering  up  all  the  forces  of  our  being  and 
pouring  them  into  its  mighty  stream.  It  is  God 
Himself,  in  us,  who  inspires  such  a  prayer,  not  only 
revealing  His  will  in  us,  but  evoking  such  trust  in 
him  and  such  mastery  of  ourselves  that  all  our 
powers  are  at  His  service,  and  our  lives  become  a 
part  of  His  plan.  The  secret  of  availing  prayer  is 
that  of  having  oneself  so  centrally  held  that  in  that 
high  moment  one  does  actually,  and  with  concen- 
trated conscious  effort,  will  the  will  of  God,  in  which 
is  our  peace.  It  is  a  moment  of  intense  spiritual 
sensibility  in  which  the  direction  of  the  pressure  of 
the  Divine  purpose  in  us  is  vividly  realised,  and  loy- 
ally obeyed.  Thereafter  the  practice  of  life,  in  spite 
of  its  falterings  and  waywardness,  is  to  the  end  that 


THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SAINTS  151 

we  may  live  more  nearly  as  we  pray,  laying  hold  of 
what  is  already  our  own,  asking  that  we  may  be  able, 
willing,  and  worthy  to  receive  it. 

Alas !  few  of  us  attain  to  this  supreme  and  victor- 
ious life  of  prayer.  One  reads  the  life  of  Santa 
Theresa  with  a  kind  of  awed  fear,  so  eager,  so  dar- 
ing, so  profound  was  her  quest  and  cultivation  of 
the  art  of  prayer.  Like  St.  Francis,  she  prayed 
until  her  life  became  a  prayer,  and  therefore  a 
power,  in  which  her  rippling  humour,  her  fine 
sagacity,  and  her  tireless  industry  became  the  tools 
of  God  for  the  doing  of  His  work.  Such  a  height 
Is  attained  only  by  a  great  surrender  to  the  will  of 
God,  and  a  firmer  loyalty  to  it,  a  quicker  response, 
a  fuller  courage,  a  richer  desire  than  we  have  won. 
It  means  a  sustained  endeavour,  a  prolonged  aspira- 
tion and  a  gradual  and  growing  insight.  But  we  are 
weak;  the  spirit  is  willing,  but  the  flesh  is  frail.  Ever 
more  we  try  a  little  and  fail  much,  striving  for  the 
heights,  but  slipping  back  to  the  lower  levels.  But 
we  must  not  give  up  until  we  learn  the  great  lan- 
guage, until  we  catch  the  high  accent,  if  only  it  be 
here  a  word  and  there  a  tone.  Again,  and  yet  again, 
we  must  come  back  to  the  altar  and  renew  the  dis- 
ciplined motive,  learning  to  give  ourselves  away  a 
little  more  ungrudgingly  to  the  blessed  will.  Hence 
the  hour  of  prayer  with  its  holy  Intimacies  by  which 
heart  may  draw  to  heart,  and  love  answer  to  love. 

If  we  are  to  wield  the  Sword  of  the  Saints — the 
sword  with  which  Greatheart  tramped  the  world 
defending  the  right  and  protecting  the  weak — we 


152  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

must  first  fashion  it,  and  then  learn  how  to  use  it. 
Yet  what  amateurs  we  are,  half  afraid  of  the  weapon 
given  us  to  fight  the  foes  that  besiege  the  soul  and 
menace  it!  Even  the  best  of  us  can  do  little  more 
than  to  ask  God  to  forgive  the  poverty,  the  petti- 
ness, the  folly  of  our  prayers,  and  to  listen  not  to 
our  petitions,  but  to  the  dumb  cry  of  our  needs. 
Often  we  pray  earnestly  for  what  is  already  our  own, 
neglected  and  unappropriated,  not  knowing  that 
there  must  be  not  only  the  will  to  pray,  but  the  will 
to  receive  and  the  willingness  to  listen  for  the  an- 
swer. Often  we  pray  for  that  which  we  must  win 
ourselves,  and  then  labour  endlessly  for  that  which 
can  come  to  us  only  in  prayer.  There  is  no  need  to 
say  that  we  frequently  pray  for  that  which  can  never 
be  ours  and  would  be  our  ruin  if  we  had  it.  The 
disciples  of  Jesus  were  often  foolish  and  faithless, 
but  they  were  wise  when  they  asked  their  Master, 
"Lord,  teach  us  how  to  pray." 

It  is  the  testimony  of  the  masters  of  the  spiritual 
life  that  prayer.  In  its  higher  reaches,  is  not  only 
something  to  be  learned,  but  that  it  is  a  high  and 
austere  art.  We  who  are  beginners  must  begin  at 
the  beginning,  and  the  first  thing  is  actually  to  pray. 
The  wish  to  pray  is  not  enough;  we  must  have  "the 
wish  that  prays."  Since  prayer  is  the  focal  point 
of  the  soul,  it  is  by  the  act  of  prayer — and  the  atti- 
tude of  the  body,  even — that  the  soul  commits  itself 
to  the  highest.  Things  are  hazy  and  uncertain,  until 
reduced  to  words.  The  mind,  thronged  with  a  mul- 
titude of  conflicting  thoughts  and  desires,  or  waver- 


THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SAINTS  153 

ing  between  opposite  decisions,  is  clarified  by  actual 
prayer,  and  selects  one  motive,  one  plan.  Instantly 
the  fog  clears,  and  the  thing  uttered,  the  fact  or 
principle,  stands  out  in  relief. 

"Certain  thoughts  are  prayers,"  said  Hugo;  but 
when  we  pray  we  pledge  ourselves  to  them,  and  a 
vague  thought  becomes  a  star  to  light  our  path.  God 
is  seeking  to  guide  us,  but  only  to  one  who  prays 
can  He  make  Himself  vivid,  not  merely  as  an  idea 
in  the  mind,  but  as  a  living  reality  and  Friend. 

Prayer  is  not  only  "the  practice  of  the  presence 
of  God";  it  is  the  realisation  of  His  presence.  For 
that  reason,  it  must  be  regular,  "putting  habit  on 
the  side  of  the  highest  life,"  as  Gladstone  advised  his 
children.  The  human  spirit  is  as  mutable  as  the 
sea,  rising  and  falling  at  the  touch  of  vagrant  moods 
which  are  difficult  to  control.  "Why  art  thou  cast 
down,  O  my  soul?"  cried  the  Psalmist  in  his  dialogue 
with  his  fitful,  restless  soul.  Such  moods  come  we 
know  not  whence,  but  they  will  have  less  power 
over  us  if  they  have  set  against  them  the  habit  of 
quiet  prayer  in  which,  by  lifting  a  spiritual  curtain, 
we  can  enter  into  a  House  of  Quiet,  leaving  fret  and 
worry  and  fear  behind.  Thus  our  weakness  becomes 
strength,  our  words  deeds.  There  is  a  very  real 
sense  in  which  we  can  truly  "pray  without  ceasing," 
a  habit  of  the  heart  by  which  we  may  live  for  God, 
in  God,  to  God  every  moment  of  the  day,  making 
the  thought  of  Him  a  constant  and  holy  attitude 
of  the  mind;  and  thus  be  armoured  against  many 
ills.     Fenelon  is  a  wise  teacher  here : 


154  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

"Accustom  yourself  gradually  to  let  your  mental  prayers 
spread  over  all  your  daily  external  occupations.  Speak,  act, 
work  quietly,  as  though  you  were  praying,  as,  indeed,  you 
ought  to  be.  Do  everything  without  excitement,  simply  in 
the  spirit  of  grace.  So  soon  as  you  perceive  natural  activity 
gliding  in,  recall  yourself  quietly  into  the  presence  of  God. 
Hearken  to  what  the  leadings  of  grace  prompt.  You  will 
find  yourself  infinitely  more  quiet,  your  words  will  be  fewer 
and  more  effectual,  and  while  doing  less,  what  you  do  will 
be  more  profitable." 

By  such  methods  the  Saints  realised  inwardly  a 
divine  life  Inexhaustible  In  Its  fulness,  Indomitable  in 
Its  power,  by  which  they  were  able,  not  to  alter  things 
after  their  desires,  but  to  become  doers  of  the  will 
of  God.  The  Sword  of  the  Spirit  Is  the  Word  of 
God,  says  the  Apostle.  Not  simply  the  Bible,  but 
all  that  endless  dialogue  between  God  and  the  soul, 
whereby  man  learns  what  life  is,  what  It  means,  and 
how  to  use  It  for  the  highest  ends.  For  man  does 
not  live  by  bread  alone,  but  by  every  word  that  pro- 
ceedeth  out  of  the  mouth  of  God;  and  prayer  Is  not 
simply  asking,  but  receiving,  realising,  achieving. 
No  matter  what  the  facts  may  be,  if,  deep  down  In 
our  hearts,  we  utter  the  word  Father,  the  way  is 
clearer  and  the  victory  Is  won. 

Then  into  His  hand  went  mine. 

And  into  my  heart  came  He. 
And  I  walked  in  a  light  divine 

The  path  I  had  feared  to  see. 


THE  INTERCESSORS 

"If  Thou  wilt  forgive  their  sin — ;  and  if  not,  blot  me,  I 
pray  Thee,  out  of  Thy  book  which  Thou  hast  written." 

Ex.  xxxii.  32. 

"The  supplication  of  a  righteous  man  availeth  much." 

— James  v.  16. 

"He  ever  liveth  to  make  intercession." — Heb.  vii.  25 

AFTER  more  than  three  years  of  war  we  are 
bidden  to  keep  this  the  first  Sunday  in  the 
New  Year  as  a  day  of  solemn  intercession  to  Al- 
mighty God.  It  is  wise,  it  is  altogether  fitting  that 
we  should  do  so.  Prayer  is  always  timely,  and  never 
more  so  than  in  this  dark  time  when  we  need  strength 
for  the  thing  that  is  to  do,  insight  to  lead  us  along  a 
dim  path,  and  comfort  to  sustain  us  under  our  crush- 
ing sorrows.  We  are  sorely  stricken,  and,  like  Lin- 
coln in  his  day  of  trial,  we  are  driven  to  our  knees 
because  we  have  nowhere  else  to  go.  It  is  a  day  not 
only  for  honesty  of  thought,  but  for  the  frankest 
kind  of  speech,  man  to  man,  and  the  final  candour  of 
hearts  laid  bare. 

Many  humiliations  are  teaching  us  humility,  yet 
much  of  the  old  arrogance,  the  old  vanity,  the  old 
vainglory  remains  to  distort  the  public  temper. 
There  will  be  further  chastenings  of  spirit,  further 
sorrows,  further  losses,  alas,  and  surely  they  must 
bring  us  down  from  our  towering  pride,  from  our 
complacent  self-righteousness,  to  the  very  feet  of 

^Day  of  National  Intercession,  6th  January  1918. 
155 


156  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

God  the  Father.  To-day  we  are  not  Englishmen, 
not  Americans,  but  human  beings  seeking  to  know 
the  will  of  God  and  how  to  do  it.  There  will  be 
other  days  for  dealing  with  men;  to-day  we  must 
deal  with  God.  Not  the  God  of  England,  not  the 
God  of  America,  but  the  Father  of  humanity  who 
hath  made  of  one  blood  all  nations  and  tribes,,  whose 
will  is  the  law  of  the  universe :  a  God  so  great  that 
we  in  the  City  Temple,  and  our  brethren  in  the 
Abbey,  are  like  children  playing  with  the  toys  of 
religion.  Yet  hath  He  put  it  into  our  hearts  to 
pray,  and  if  we  seek  Him  with  earnest  minds  He 
will  show  us  His  way. 

It  Is  a  fact  that  the  heartfelt  prayer  of  a  righteous 
man  avalleth  much — how  much  we  do  not  know,  nor 
can  we  trace  Its  Influence.  It  goes  too  fast,  too  far, 
for  us  to  follow.  Only  God  could  write  the  history 
of  the  prayer  of  a  little  child  at  eventide.  To 
attempt  to  fathom  the  meaning  of  intercessory 
prayer  would  be  to  plunge  beyond  our  depth  into 
the  profoundest  mysteries  of  life  and  faith,  and 
this  is  not  the  day  for  that  adventure.  It  is  the 
prayer  of  a  righteous  man  that  avalleth — but,  alas, 
we  are  not  righteous  men,  much  less  a  righteous  na- 
tion. England  is  not  righteous.  America  I  know 
is  not  righteous.  Our  cause  Is  righteous,  but  we  are 
not.  We  are  fighting  for  justice,  but  we  are  not  just. 
It  would  be  easy  to  bring  in  a  bill  of  particulars,  but 
It  Is  not  needed.  Our  conscience  indicts  and  convicts 
us  before  God,  and  our  social  order  confirms  the  in- 
dictment. 


THE  INTERCESSOR  157 

But  enough:  on  this  day  we  do  not  criticise  one 
another,  but  all  confess  our  sins,  beseeching  the 
cleansing  mercy  of  God,  that  so  our  common  prayer 
may  be  pure  and  true. 

Who  shall  ascend  into  the  hill  of  the  Lord  ? 
He  that  hath  clean  hands  and  a  pure  heart. 

Therefore  our  first  prayer  must  be  for  that  purity 
of  heart  which  brings  the  vision  of  God,  that  our 
desires,  purified  of  littleness,  disinfected  of  selfish- 
ness, may  be  one  with  the  desire  of  God.  So,  and 
only  so,  shall  we  have  not  only  the  will  to  pray — 
which  is  much  more  than  a  mere  wish — but  also  the 
will  to  receive  the  answer  of  God  and  do  it,  whatever 
that  answer  may  be.  A  Day  of  Prayer  for  a  nation 
is  idle  make-believe  unless  that  people,  single-minded 
and  faithful,  is 'willing  to  do  the  will  of  God.  To- 
day a  nation- — or  at  least  an  Inner  circle  of  inter- 
cessors in  its  name — rededicates,  consecrates,  gives 
itself  anew  Into  the  hands  of  God,  to  be  used  as  His 
instrument  for  the  fulfilment  of  His  purpose.  If  this 
is  to  be  a  real  Day  of  Prayer,  and  not  a  mere  form, 
we  must  think  of  what  we  are  doing. 

Think  what  intercessory  prayer  means,  and  ask 
yourself  if  we — if  you — are  equal  to  it.  Prayer  is 
not  simply  the  uprising  passion  and  desire  of  man: 
it  is  the  spirit  of  God  rising  up  in  man  in  longings 
and  cries  which  cannot  be  uttered,  liberating  the 
resources  of  the  human  personality  for  the  uses  of 
the  divine  will  and  work.  The  eternal  purpose  is 
wrought  out  upon  earth,  but  not  without  human 


158  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

co-operation;  "we  are  God's  fellow-workers."  To- 
day, If  our  prayer  is  sincere,  the  surrendered  will  of 
a  nation  will  be  added  to  the  sum  of  forces  In  the 
hand  of  God,  working  with  Him  for  His  kingdom. 
Are  we  willing  to  have  it  so?  When  the  Master 
asked  His  disciples  if  they  they  were  able  to  be  bap- 
tised with  the  baptism  He  was  baptised  with,  they 
said,  glibly  enough,  "We  are  able" — little  knowing 
what  they  meant.  "It  Is  the  very  nature  of  faith 
that  It  commits  us  to  more  than  we  are  aware  of  at 
the  time" ;  It  involves  us  in  the  play  of  forces  vaster 
than  we  know,  and  lays  tasks  upon  us  we  did  not  pro- 
pose to  ourselves.  Are  we  able  to  do  and  bear  and 
be  what  we  ask  to-day  at  this  altar,  committing  our- 
selves with  that  daring  which  is  more  than  wisdom, 
to  the  ways  of  God?  If  the  will  of  God  be  some- 
thing different  from  our  will,  what  then  ?  If  it  means 
that  we  must  endure  further  suffering,  further  loss 
and  tragedy,  are  we  willing  to  say,  like  the  Master, 
"Not  my  will,  but  Thine  be  done"?  If  so,  England 
will  be  a  different  land  to-morrow  from  what  it  is 
to-day. 

Prayer  not  only  discovers  God  in  new  and  un- 
dreamed-of ways,  opening  the  heart  to  the  control  of 
the  Divine  Spirit  in  a  manner  beyond  our  imagining, 
It  also  discovers  us  to  ourselves  and  to  one  another. 
A  traveller  crossing  the  Atlantic  came  to  the  Azores, 
and  tells  how  he  felt  the  isolation  of  those  tiny 
Islands  in  the  wide  expanse  of  waters.  They  seemed 
lonely,  bereft  of  all  kinship  or  connection  with  the 
great  continents  or  with  other  islands  of  the  sea. 


THE  INTERCESSOR  159 

But  he  paused  to  think,  and  knew  that  they  were  not 
isolated.  They  are  but  the  tips  of  high  mountains 
whose  bases  reach  down  to  the  bed  of  the  ocean. 
Through  this  common  base  they  are  united  to  one 
another;  and  then,  along  the  ocean  bed,  they  are 
joined  to  all  continents  and  islands  everywhere.  This 
is  a  parable  of  human  life.  Often,  in  this  human 
ocean  called  London,  we  may  seem  lonely,  but,  like 
the  Azores,  we  are  joined  with  all  men  everywhere 
in  the  depth  of  our  nature;  and  prayer  is  a  discovery 
of  the  Life  that  binds  us  one  to  another.  It  reveals 
a  community  of  life  and  need,  and  along  the  ties  that 
unite  us  influences,  messages,  and  power  go  to  and 
fro. 

Here  is  a  realm  of  mystery,  not  explorable,  but 
we  may  say  that  it  is  like  the  scale  of  registers  in  a 
wireless  telegraph  instrument.  When  we  send  a  mes- 
sage in  one  register,  all  instruments  set  for  that  reg- 
ister receive  it,  if  the  power  be  strong  enough.  Just 
so,  there  is  a  common  human  register,  if  we  can  find 
it,  which  joins  us  with  all  men,  and  more  surely,  it 
may  be,  with  those  we  love,  so  that  in  ways  beyond 
our  tracing  we  can  send  and  receive  help,  hope, 
power.  Who  can  tell  what  prayers,  as  units  of 
energy,  or  as  forces  of  love,  may  become  in  a  world 
where  all  things  lead  out  into  mystery,  and  nothing 
is  so  unknown  as  the  human  personality.  The  ques- 
tion of  natural  law  does  not  enter,  since  prayer  is  it- 
self a  law  whose  working  we  do  not  know  and  do  not 
need  to  know  in  order  to  use  it.  Jesus  did  not 
argue  about  prayer — He  prayed.     Amid  the  mys- 


160  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

terlous  forces  at  work  upon  us  and  within  us,  since 
they  are  of  God,  we  may  be  sure  not  only,  as  Mere- 
dith said,  that  "who  rises  from  prayer  a  better  man, 
his  prayer  is  answered,"  but  also  that  other  men  are 
better  too.  When  the  earth  record  is  read  in  the 
light  of  eternal  values,  who  knows  what  a  testimony 
it  will  be  to  the  power  of  sincere,  heartfelt  prayer ! 

Thus  prayer  not  only  links  us  with  men  every- 
where, but  takes  us  out  of  ourselves,  as  it  did  Moses 
when  he  pleaded  for  his  people  in  their  sin.  When 
the  law-giver  came  down  from  the  Mount  of  Vision 
bearing  the  Tables  of  the  Law,  he  found  the  people 
dancing  about  a  Golden  Calf.  Life  always  becomes 
a  feverish,  fanatical  dance  when  it  loses  the  vision 
of  the  Eternal — as  it  did  in  England  before  the  war, 
and  in  America  where  we  worshipped  the  horrible 
gods  of  sport  and  speed  and  splendour.  Turning 
from  the  scene,  the  law-giver  went  again  into  the 
Mount  of  Vision,  now  become  a  Mount  of  Interces- 
sion, and  offered  one  of  the  profoundest,  sublimest 
prayers  in  history:  "If  Thou  wilt  forgive  their 
sin — ;  and  if  not,  blot  me,  I  pray  Thee,  out  of  Thy 
book  which  Thou  hast  written."  If  his  people  were 
to  die,  he  wanted  to  die  with  them — aye,  even  to  die 
in  their  stead — and  have  his  name  erased  from  the 
memory  of  God.  Such  a  prayer  compelled  an  an- 
swer, for  that  it  united  itself  with  the  love  and  will 
of  God,  invoking  His  own  nature  in  its  behalf.  If 
only  we  had  the  love,  the  heroism,  the  faith  to  rise 
to  such  a  height,  what  wonders  might  not  be  wrought 
in  this  land,  and  in  all  lands,  on  the  morrow! 


THE  INTERCESSOR  161 

Not  yet  have  we  guessed,  much  less  tested,  the 
incredible  power  that  lies  in  prayer.  Let  us  dare 
to  make  trial  of  it  to-day,  and  all  the  days,  if  per- 
chance we  may  learn  more  of  its  mystery  and  its 
uses,  like  Forbes  Robinson — not  the  actor  of  similar 
name — albeit  he,  too,  is  a  man  of  sincere  and  simple 
faith,  and  a  noble  Christian  gentleman — but  a  young 
saint  of  the  English  Church.  He  was  so  radiant,  so 
happy,  so  wise,  as  we  come  to  know  him  in  his  Let- 
ters to  His  Friends,  that  the  very  thought  of  him 
is  like  a  footfall,  always  light,  of  one  untimely  gone 
away.  He  was  an  apostle  in  intercession,  and  prayer 
was  his  very  life.  He  discovered  men  by  praying 
for  them,  finding  in  each  one  something  unique, 
peculiar,  and  precious,  not  to  be  found  anywhere 
else.  Life,  to  him,  was  love,  and  love  lived  in 
prayer,  and  prayer  was  a  perpetual  discovery  of  both 
God  and  man.  He  learned  that  prayer  abolishes 
hate,  and  that  if  we  pray  for  a  man  we  cannot  have 
any  feeling  of  ill-will,  and  that  he  will  come  to  know 
the  fact.  He  believed — he  knew — that  he  could  in 
this  way  bring  to  bear  upon  men  an  influence  more 
effective  than  any  word  of  direct  teaching  or  advice. 
To-day  there  are  Cambridge  men  whose  eyes  fill  with 
a  soft  mist  of  memory  and  reverence  at  the  very 
mention  of  his  name. 

What  wonder  that  on  a  day  like  this,  when  our 
hearts  are  so  deeply  stirred,  we  cannot  keep  our 
thoughts  from  going  afar,  following  those  who  have 
gone  behind  the  veil.  It  is  human,  and  God  meant 
it  to  be  so.     My  friend,  if  on  this  day  your  heart 


162  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

asks  you  to  offer  a  prayer  for  one  who  has  vanished 
— do  It.  No  matter  what  the  theologians  say.  The 
human  heart  divinely  touched  Is  the  best  theologian. 
God  win  hear  and  understand,  and  what  Is  in  accord 
with  His  holy  will,  which  Is  wider  than  we  know,  will 
be  done.  This  Is  a  matter  about  which  to  be  reverent 
and  reticent;  but  at  least  we  can  commend  those 
whom  we  have  "loved  and  lost  awhile"  to  His  Fath- 
erly love,  even  as  we  commend  ourselves,  our  na- 
tion, and  our  cause  to  which  so  many  whom  we  miss 
have  paid  "the  last  full  measure  of  devotion."  Be- 
yond this  we  may  not  go,  leaving  the  things  our  poor 
stammering  tongues  cannot  utter  to  Him  "who  ever 
liveth  to  make  Intercession,"  In  whose  name  we  offer 
our  prayer  and  dedicate  our  lives. 


THE  SHADOW  CHRIST 

"The  word  of  the  Lord  came  unto  me,  saying:  'Jeremiah, 
what  seest  thou?'  And  I  said,  'I  see  a  rod  of  an  almond 
tree.'" — Jer.  i.   ii. 

OFTEN  it  has  been  noted  of  late  that  the  minds 
of  men  are  turning  back  to  the  great  prophets 
for  light  and  leading  in  these  difficult  days.  Some, 
to  be  sure,  find  in  their  pages  amazing  forecastings 
of  the  end  of-the  world,  but  the  deeper  mind  of  the 
day  turns  to  them  for  a  deeper  reason.  They,  too, 
struggled  for  faith  in  terrible  days,  in  the  midst  of 
baffling  perplexities,  in  the  presence  of  unaccountable 
tragedies,  and  it  is  thus  that  no  teachers  have  more 
to  tell  us  than  those  voices  that  speak  to  us  out  of 
the  old  Hebrew  centuries.  For  comfort  and  com- 
mand, for  moral  insight  and  spiritual  intuition,  those 
mighty  seers  are  still  the  masters  and  deliverers  of 
mankind. 

There  are  classic  men  as  there  are  classic  books. 
The  classic  man  is  one  who,  speaking  to  his  own  age, 
strikes  a  note  so  deep,  and  true,  and  haunting  that 
it  sounds  for  ever;  and  such  a  man  is  the  great 
prophet.  Isaiah  and  Savonarola  may  deal  with  civic 
affairs,  St.  Paul  and  Luther  with  the  freedom  of  the 
soul,  Ezekiel  and  Augustine  with  the  outward  altar, 
St.  John  and  Bunyan  with  the  passion  for  perfection. 

163 


164  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

But  underneath  all  diversities  of  gift  and  testimony 
they  bear  witness  for  the  Eternal,  uniting  the  two 
tokens  of  a  god-illumined  man.  They  turn  the  hearts 
of  the  fathers  to  their  sons,  and  the  hearts  of  the 
sons  to  their  fathers;  that  is,  they  dispose  the  old 
to  moral  forwardness,  to  reverence  for  the  new,  and 
the  young  to  spiritual  wisdom,  to  reverence  for  the 
age-long  values  of  the  past.  All  who  truly  speak  in 
the  name  of  God,  and  as  for  His  will,  unite  a  pro- 
found piety  with  an  unconquerable  hope. 

No  other  race  can  show  a  nobler  dynasty  of  moral 
genius  than  the  Hebrew ;  and  in  their  long,  troubled, 
revealing  history  there  is  no  figure  more  heroic, 
none  at  once  more  tragic  and  triumphant  than  Jere- 
miah. Unfortunately  a  shallow  wit  has  misread  his 
life,  making  him  appear  as  a  lachrymose  weakling, 
tender  and  tearful,  and  so  he  is  portrayed.  He  was 
indeed  a  man  of  sorrows  and  acquainted  with  grief, 
but  he  was  no  more  a  "weeping  prophet"  because 
he  may  have  written  the  Lamentations  that  bear  his 
name  than  Tennyson  was  a  weeping  poet  because  he 
wrote  "In  Memoriam,"  or  Milton  because  he  wrote 
"Lycidas."  If  his  head  was  a  fountain  of  tears  there 
was  reason  for  it,  because  he  was  doomed  to  the  sad- 
dest fate  that  may  befall  a  great,  true-hearted,  clear- 
minded  man — the  fate,  that  is,  of  living  in  an  age  of 
decay,  ruin,  and  disaster,  seeing  it  all,  warning  his 
people  against  it,  but  powerless  to  stay  or  avert  it. 
History  knows  no  darker  tragedy,  and  therefore  no 
figure  grander,  more  lonely,  more  pathetic  than  the 
Suffering  Servant  of  God. 


THE  SHADOW  CHRIST  165 

All  spiritual  experience  is  mysterious,  but  with  the 
prophet-soul  the  mystery  deepens  because  his  nature 
is  more  open  to  the  Unseen — as  we  may  see  in  the 
call  of  Jeremiah.  In  Palestine  the  almond-tree  puts 
forth  its  buds  early,  and  is  the  first  tree  to  prophesy 
the  coming  of  spring — the  Hebrews  called  it  the 
Watchful  Tree.  One  day,  stirred  in  spirit,  the  young 
Jeremiah  walked  in  the  fields,  drinking  in  the  early 
beauty  of  the  Flowers  of  Watchfulness,  and  there 
flashed  into  his  mind  the  thought  of  God  as  the  Great 
Watcher.  In  a  mood  dross-drained  and  holy,  wake- 
fulness to  natural  beauty  lifted  him  into  the  presence 
of  One  who  never  sleeps  nor  slumbers,  and  the 
prophet  plighted  his  faith  in  a  vision  that  never 
faded  amid  all  the  dark  confusions  of  his  life. 
Times  came  when  the  inequalities  of  life,  the  welfare 
of  the  wicked,  and  the  downfall  of  his  nation,  forced 
upon  him  keen  questions;  but  if  his  life  was  wintry, 
like  the  watchful  tree  he  kept  always  the  prophecy 
of  spring. 

Loyalty,  a  wise  teacher  has  told  us,  is  the  approach 
to  faith,  and  he  might  have  added  that  it  is  also  the 
fulfilment  of  faith,  its  vindication  and  triumph.  Of 
this  truth  there  was  never  a  finer  example  than  Jere- 
miah, of  whose  life  we  have  fuller  knowledge  than 
we  have  of  any  other  great  prophet,  owing  to  the 
love  and  fidelity  of  Baruch.  No  other  prophet  had 
so  devoted  a  biographer,  and  the  order,  or  disorder, 
of  his  book  lets  us  see,  not  only  the  outward  events 
of  his  career,  but  its  inward  struggle,  taking  us  be- 
hind the  veil  and  showing  us  the  heart  of  the  Saint. 


166  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

It  Is  made  up  of  reminiscences,  of  Boswell-like  re- 
ports of  private  talks,  as  well  as  of  sermons  and  pro- 
nouncements. The  record  tells  us  little  of  the  early 
days,  having  been  written  after  the  prophet  had  been 
twenty  years  in  his  ministry,  and  his  message  had 
been  vindicated.  That  is  to  say,  Jeremiah  lived  be- 
fore he  wrote,  and  we  have  here  the  spiritual  strug- 
gle and  achievement  of  his  life.  We  see  him  as  his 
neighbours  knew  him,  gentle,  refined,  sympathetic, 
hungering  for  fellowship,  responsive  alike  to  natural 
beauty  and  spiritual  suggestion,  yet  intense  like  fire, 
strong  like  a  hammer — at  once  a  white  flame  and  an 
iron  column. 

Here  is  the  inner  story  of  a  man  who  lived  in  an 
earth-shaking,  world-transforming  age  like  our  own, 
in  a  period  of  upheaval  when  human  things  were 
"never  at  one  stay."  What  Belgium  and  Serbia 
endure  to-day  his  land  suffered  then,  in  the  clash  of 
empires  amid  whose  conflicts  it  was  crushed.  He 
saw  his  people  slaughtered  and  carried  away  into 
captivity;  he  saw  the  sacred  city  burned.  Held  by 
ties  of  care  and  religion  and  the  promptings  of  a 
great  soul,  he  pleaded,  suffered,  and  endured  to  the 
bitter  end,  his  genius  shining  like  a  star  in  the  gath- 
ering clouds.  An  ardent  patriot,  he  was  summoned 
to  Interpret  the  purpose  of  God  In  the  downfall  of 
his  nation,  like  the  saint  of  Serbia  in  our  day  ^ — only, 
he  himself  suffered  death  at  the  hands  of  his  people 
In  the  final  disaster.  What  this  meant  as  a  feat  of 
human  courage  and  divine  grace,  as  a  victory  of 

*  The  Agony  of  the  Church,  by  Nicholai  Velirairovic. 


THE  SHADOW  CHRIST  167 

faith  and  fortitude,  is  told  us  in  a  spiritual  diary 
written  day  by  day  in  his  heart  as  he  wrought  and 
wondered,  doubted,  suffered,  and  dared. 

Truly  he  was  a  man  of  like  passions  with  our- 
selves, as  all  the  great  ones  are,  albeit  endowed  with 
the  sorrowful  and  great  gift  of  prophecy,  responsive 
to  God  as  an  aeolian  harp  to  the  wind,  and  eager  to 
discover  and  obey  His  will.  He  saw  clearly  the 
hardships,  the  persecutions,  the  ostracism,  and  the 
defeats  that  awaited  him,  as  they  await  every  great 
and  sane  soul  in  a  day  of  insanity.  He  was  keenly 
aware  of  qualities  in  himself  that  hindered  rather 
than  helped  his  work,  the  questioning  that  weakened 
action,  the  hunger  for  a  fellowship  denied,  the  feel- 
ing of  helplessness  in  the  presence  of  his  task.  Yet 
he  walked  a  straight  course  through  a  long,  danger- 
ous career,  kepf  his  faith  in  God,  and  his  nervous, 
inquiring  spirit  brought  him  to  grips  with  a  question 
never  faced  before,  and  made  him  one  of  those  sons 
of  the  Spirit -whose  influence  never  dies.  Walking  a 
hard  and  lonely  way,  he  came  upon  truths  unguessed 
by  those  whose  path  is  smoother  and  whose  heart  is 
less  torn  by  dpubt  and  grief. 

Like  the  men  of  to-day,  Jeremiah  faced  the  mys- 
tery of  arrogant,  organised  wickedness  and  the  seem- 
ing victory  of  might  over  right.  He  saw  it  clearly 
and  without  evasion.  He  did  not  solve  it.  No  man 
can.  Such  mysteries  have  no  solution  on  earth ;  but, 
when  they  seem  about  to  block  all  further  advance, 
God  shows,  now  in  one  way,  now  in  another,  that  life 
is  still  livable  and  faith  still  triumphant.    This  was 


168  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

the  only  answer  Jeremiah  received.  It  was  no 
solution;  but  it  was  a  way  out.  Faith  saved  the 
situation,  even  if  it  did  not  solve  the  problem.^  But 
not  without  bitter  struggle,  misgivings,  and  agony, 
which  wrung  from  him  cries  that  echo  to  this  day. 
Only  a  man  who  was  very  sure  of  God  could  speak 
the  words  in  the  opening  of  the  12th  chapter,  and 
again  in  the  20th  chapter,  two  of  the  most  impres- 
sive pages  in  the  history  of  the  soul,  revealing  the 
depth  of  his  pain  and  the  daring  of  his  faith.  He 
rested  at  last,  as  we  well  may  rest,  upon  the  fact 
that  his  work  was  not  his  own,  but  God's,  and  found 
in  that  fact  his  sole  and  sufficient  support  for  a  hard- 
fought  life. 

What  wonder  that  this  tormented  man  made  dis- 
coveries of  the  power  and  possibilities  of  prayer, 
such  as  no  one  had  made  before?  none  before  him 
had  so  clearly  passed  beyond  petition  into  that 
larger,  deeper  field  of  fellowship  with  God.  Jere- 
miah asked  little;  he  prayed  much.  He  was  the 
father  of  that  truer,  profounder  prayer  which  does 
not  ask  for  things,  but  for  God;  not  for  gifts,  but 
for  the  Giver.  It  was  this  mastery  of  the  uses  of 
prayer  that  made  him  so  clear-sighted  a  leader,  who 
did  not  mistake  a  reformation  for  a  regeneration, 
or  the  form  for  the  reality.  It  was  prayer  that 
enabled  him  to  achieve  the  most  difficult  task  that 
falls  to  the  lot  of  man,  namely,  that  of  enlarging 
and  deepening  the  conception  of  God,  which  gave 
a  new  date  to  the  history  of  faith.    Prayer  lifted  him 

*  The  Prophet  of  the  Spirit,  by  L.  B.  Longaon, 


THE  SHADOW  CHRIST  169 

above  book-religion,  above  ritual-religion,  into  that 
eternal  communion  where  men  know  the  living  word 
from  the  lips  of  the  living  God.  Out  of  sorrow,  out 
of  ruin,  out  of  defeat  he  rose  victorious  and  became 
a  prophet  of  the  Eternal  Religion.  As  we  may  read 
in  words  which  are  perhaps  the  summit  of  Old  Testa- 
ment vision: 

"This  is  the  covenant  that  I  will  make  with  the  House 
of  Israel  after  those  days,  saith  the  Lord :  I  will  put  my  law 
in  their  inward  parts,  and  write  it  in  their  hearts;  and  I 
will  be  their  God,  and  they  shall  be  My  people.  And  they 
shall  teach  no  more  every  man  his  neighbour,  and  every 
man  his  brother,  saying,  'Know  the  Lord';  for  they  shall 
know  Me,  from  the  least  unto  the  greatest  of  them,  saith 
the  Lord;  for  I  will  forgive  their  iniquity,  and  I  will  re- 
member their  sin  no  more." 

Such  words  belong  to  all  ages,  all  races,  all 
tongues,  all  faiths.  They  outrun  the  senses  and  the 
deductions  of  the  intellect;  they  are  spiritual  intui- 
tions in  which  the  human  soul  stands  face  to  face 
with  the  Eternal,  and  deep  calleth  unto  deep. 
"Enough  that  he  saw  it  once;  we  shall  see  It  by  and 
by."  Here  is  the  New  Covenant  to  the  fulfilment  of 
which  Jesus  gave  His  life,  and  it  is  therefore  that 
Jeremiah  is  so  often  associated  with  Him.  Indeed, 
the  parallel  is  very  striking  between  their  lives,  even 
in  outward  fortune  and  fate.  Both  predicted  the  fall 
of  the  Temple;  both  aroused  the  hatred  of  the 
priests;  both  were  put  to  death  by  the  people  they 
tried  to  save.     The  words  "Led  as  a  lamb  to  the 


170  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

slaughter"  are  used  of  both.  Both  taught  the  for- 
giving love  of  God,  and  both  uttered  words  which 
are  a  part  of  the  life  of  faith  for  ever.  That  is  to 
say,  Jeremiah,  lifted  by  his  sorrow  into  the  shadow 
of  a  mighty,  redeeming  love,  became,  so  to  speak, 
"the  almost  Christ,  the  Christ  of  the  night — a 
Shadow  Christ." 

And  so,  instead  of  taking  you  back  into  a  far  time, 
my  aim  has  been  to  bring  a  much-suffering,  victorious 
soul  of  times  agone  into  the  glare  of  the  tragedy  in 
which  we  live,  that  so  you  may  see  to  what  revela- 
tions we  may  be  led  by  obedience  to  the  heavenly 
vision  and  the  power  of  prayer.  What  though  the 
vision  come  in  the  bud  of  an  Almond  Tree,  or  in 
some  other  form,  faithfulness  to  it  is  the  secret,  and 
prayer  the  unfailing  strength  to  attain.  What  Job 
lived  through  in  a  drama,  Jeremiah  lived  through  in 
a  human  life  like  our  own,  and  in  days  like  our  own. 
What  helps  us  most  is  not  what  some  one  tells  us,  but 
the  footprints  of  one  who  walked  the  dark  way  be- 
fore us,  saw  what  we  see,  felt  what  we  feel,  and  did 
not  let  go  of  faith.  To-day,  when  so  many  are 
trying  to  live,  yet  letting  go  of  the  things  that  make 
life  worth  living,  no  voice  in  the  Bible,  save  the  voice 
of  Jesus,  has  more  to  tell  us  than  Jeremiah. 

It  may  be  that  the  Second  Isaiah,  in  the  wonder- 
ful 53rd  chapter,  saw  from  afar,  prophetically,  the 
slowly  coming  Christ,  since  "thoughts  beyond  their 
thoughts  to  those  high  bards  were  given."  However 
that  may  be,  historically  it  would  seem  that  Jere- 
miah was  the  inspiration  of  that  sublime  and  haunt- 


THE  SHADOW  CHRIST  171 

ing  vision  of  the  Suffering  Servant  of  God,  despised 
and  rejected  of  men,  scourged,  imprisoned,  and  put 
to  death.  Just  so,  we  who  walk  in  these  strange, 
dark  days,  must  bear  about  in  our  hearts,  yea,  even 
in  our  bodies,  the  marks  of  the  Lord  Jesus,  that  we 
may  show  forth  the  sacrifice  of  Christ  till  He  come — 
each  in  his  own  way,  and  in  his  own  degree,  a 
Shadow  Christ. 

Most  sincerely 

Let  me  follow  where  Thou  leadest, 

Let  me,  bleeding  where  Thou  bleedest 

Die,  if  dying  I  may  give 

Life  to  one  who  asks  to  live, 

And  more  nearly, 

Living  thus,  resemble  Thee. 


THE  ETERNAL  COMMUNION 

"Before  Abraham  was,  I  am." — John  viii.  58. 

HERE  are  words  so  strange  that  they  not  only 
startle  our  attention,  but  wellnigh  confound 
us.  A  young  teacher,  not  yet  fifty  years  old,  calmly 
tells  his  hearers  that  he  lived  before  the  days  of 
Abraham.  Not  only  so,  but  He  speaks  as  if  He 
were  in  some  way  exempt  from  the  conditions  of 
time,  using  the  present  tense;  "Before  Abraham  was, 
I  am."  Obviously  here  is  something  quite  unlike  the 
ordinary  paradox  such  as  all  mystical  teachers  em- 
ploy, and  must  employ.  Either  these  words  have  no 
meaning  at  all,  or  they  have  something  very  deep 
and  true  and  wonderful  to  tell  us.  One  does  not 
wonder  that  the  men  who  heard  such  words  were 
puzzled,  and  we  can  hardly  blame  them  for  search- 
ing for  stones  to  throw  at  the  Speaker. 

Truly,  this  is  a  tantahsing  text.  With  the  dogmas 
founded  upon  it  dealing  with  the  life  of  Christ  before 
His  advent  in  the  flesh,  we  have  not  now  to  do. 
They  are  alike  dark  and  difficult,  if  not  doubtful. 
So  far  as  His  own  words  were  reported,  Jesus  Him- 
self spoke  of  these  things  only  in  hints  and  para- 
doxes, in  words  cryptic  and  dim ;  and  where  He  was 
so  reserved  it  ill  becomes  others  to  be  talkative. 
About  the  most  ordinary  person  there  is  a  deep  mys- 

172 


THE  ETERNAL  COMMUNION  173 

tery,  while  above  the  spiritually  great  brood  clouds 
and  darkness  which  none  can  penetrate.     If  we  can- 
not fathom  our  own  nature,  there  is  little  hope  that 
we  can  measure  One  who  was  the  most  majestic  and 
appealing  of  all  the  masters  and  deliverers  of  life 
that  ever  came  forth  "out  of  the  bosom  of  human- 
ity."    No,  our  interest  to-day  is  rather  in  the  tense 
of  the  text,  as  bespeaking  a  kingdom  in  which  all 
seekers  and  lovers  of  God  live  in  an  Eternal  Present. 
Every  seer,  every  prophet,   every  great  idealist 
who  has  shed  his  light  upon  the  darkness  of  this 
world,  has  borne  witness  to  the  reality  of  such  a 
kingdom.    With  one  accord,  from  Buddha,  Socrates, 
and  Aurelius,  to  Jesus  and  His  Apostles,  through  a 
long  array  of  saints,  mystics,  and  poets,  down  to 
the  Ruskins,  Emersons,   and  Tagores  of  our  own 
day,  they  prophesy  of  a  realm  in  which  the  great 
ideals  of  Love,  Justice,  Truth,  Service,  Beauty  have 
security  and  significance.     To  me  it  is  the  most  elo- 
quent and  touching  fact  in  human  history  that  in 
every  age  men  have  sought  citizenship  in  a  kingdom 
where  a  thousand  years  are  as  a  day,  seeking  to  bring 
the  power  of  eternal  ideals  to  bear  upon  the  ordinary 
life  of  mortals,  and  to  send  through  that  ordinary  life 
the  glory  of  the  Eternal — as  the  sun  shoots  its  trans- 
figuring light  through  a  great  dull  cloud.    And  when 
men  speak  of  that  kingdom  of  the  ideal,  time  van- 
ishes and  they  find  themselves  living  in  an  Eternal 
Communion,  as  witness  the  words  of  a  young  poet 
of  England,  Charles  Sorley,  killed  in  France  in  igi  ? : 


174.  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

He  had  a  yearning  for  the  strength 

That  comes  of  unity: 
The  union  of  one  soul  at  length 

With  its  twin  soul  to  lie; 
To  be  a  part  of  one  great  strength 

That  moves  and  cannot  die. 

If  we  turn  to  the  Bible  we  find  that  it  is  the  su- 
preme Book  of  the  Eternal  Communion,  not  only  in 
its  whole  outlook  and  emphasis,  but  in  certain  mov- 
ing passages  in  which  we  see  the  spirit  of  man  bridg- 
ing vast  gulfs  of  time  and  meeting  the  living  God  and 
its  fellows  in  the  events  and  voices  of  the  past.  For 
example,  the  prophet  Hosea  recalls  the  story  of 
Jacob's  midnight  wrestling  with  the  angel,  and  adds : 
"Yea,  he  had  power  over  the  angel  and  prevailed, 
and  wept  and  made  supplication  unto  him;  he  found 
him;  he  found  him  in  Bethel,  and  there  he  spake 
with  us."  Thus  while  speaking  of  that  great  and 
mysterious  experience,  the  prophet  suddenly  felt  that 
he  himself  had  been  there,  and  that  what  God  signi- 
fied to  the  patriarch  He  signified  to  him  also.  There 
are  similar  examples  in  the  Psalms,  as,  for  instance : 
"They  went  through  the  flood  on  foot;  and  there 
did  we  rejoice  in  Him."  Many  ages  separated  the 
Psalmist  from  that  scene,  but  those  ages  fall  away, 
and  he  is  in  fellowship  with  his  forefathers  in  their 
Divine  deliverance.  Still  another  striking  example 
is  the  132nd  Psalm,  in  which  the  remote  is  brought 
near  in  the  sudden  discovery  of  the  timeless.  Not 
only  in  the  rapt  and  lofty  lines  of  poets  and  seers 


THE  ETERNAL  COMMUNION  175 

do  we  find  this  peculiarity  of  the  Bible,  but  in  the 
calm  prose  of  history  as  well.^ 

Surely  here  is  a  reality  which,  if  it  can  be  made 
real  to  our  hearts,  will  mean  much  for  our  strength, 
our  comfort  and  our  hope.     Everyday  life  gives  us 
many  a  hint  of  it.     When  we  listen  to  great  music, 
or  noble  eloquence,  time  is  forgotten  and  we  taste 
the  joy  of  knowing,  if  only  for  an  hour,  what  the 
timeless  life  is.     Emerson  reminds  us  that  there  is 
one  mind  common  to  all  men,  whereby  we  live  in 
the  same  world  of  truth  with  Plato  and  Aristotle. 
What  is  true  to-day  was  true  when  the  great  Greeks 
taught  in  Athens,  and  it  will  be  true  ages  hence.     In 
hterature  there  is  a  zone  of  song  in  which,  if  a  man 
step,  his  words  echo  for  ages.     In  the  same  way, 
those  who,  by  loyalty  to  the  ideal,  attain  to  the  final 
beauty  of  sacrificial  character,  never  die.     They  be- 
long to  all  lands,  all  races,  all  ages.     Their  names 
are  a  part  of  the  sacred  legend  of  the  world.     Such 
hints  help  us,  it  may  be,  but  they  fail  of  making  the 
Eternal  Communion  real,  vivid,  and  satisfying  to 
our  minds  and  heart.    Let  me  go  a  step  further  and 
see  if  it  cannot  be  brought  home  to  us. 

Terrible  as  the  war  is,  unspeakably  terrible,  it 
has  brought  us  many  beautiful  things,  and  none  more 
lovely  than  the  letters  written  by  our  men  to  the  folks 
at  home.  Volumes  of  these  letters  have  been  pub- 
lished, and  in  almost  every  collection  there  is  almost 
invariably  one  that  stands  out  from  the  rest  as  par- 
ticularly significant  and  moving.    Such  a  letter  is  not 

•Hosea  xii.  4;  Psalm  Ixvi.  6;  Joshua  vi.  1-3- 


176  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

always  a  conscious  last  word,  but  something  written 
in  a  more  solemn  and  perhaps  dimly  prescient  mo- 
ment. These  letters  are  nearly  always  to  mothers, 
as  we  may  read  in  the  Letters  of  Arthur  George 
Heath,  with  a  memoir  by  Gilbert  Murray.  It  is  to 
the  mothers  the  men  turn  when  death  hovers,  not  so 
much  to  seek  comfort,  apparently,  as  to  give  it.  A 
precious  collection  of  these  letters  to  mothers  could 
be  made,  and  it  would  surely  include  the  following 
letter  written  by  Arthur  Heath  to  his  mother  a  few 
months  before  he  was  killed  in  France  on  his  twenty- 
eighth  birthday.  At  the  hour  of  parting  it  is  into  the 
sense  of  the  Eternal  Fellowship  that  he  seeks  to  lift 
her  heart  and  faith: 

"We  make  the  division  between  life  and  death  as  if  it 
were  one  of  dates — being  born  at  one  date  and  dying  some 
years  after.  But  just  as  we  sleep  half  our  lives,  so  when 
we  awake,  too,  we  know  that  often  we  are  only  half  alive. 
Life,  in  fact,  is  a  quality,  not  a  quantity,  and  there  are  cer- 
tain moments  of  real  life  whose  value  seems  so  great  that 
to  measure  them  by  the  clock,  and  find  them  to  have  lasted 
so  many  hours  or  minutes,  just,  appears  trivial  and  meaning- 
less. Their  power,  indeed,  is  such  that  you  cannot  tell  how 
long  they  last,  for  they  can  colour  all  the  rest  of  our  lives, 
and  remain  a  source  of  strength  and  joy  that  you  know  not 
to  be  exhausted,  even  though  you  cannot  trace  exactly  how 
it  works.  The  first  time  I  ever  heard  Brahms's  Requiem 
remains  with  me  as  an  instance  of  what  I  mean.  Afterwards 
you  do  not  look  back  on  such  events  as  mere  past  things 
whose  position  in  time  can  be  localised ;  you  still  feel  as  liv- 
ing the  power  that  first  awoke  in  them.     Now  if  such  mo- 


THE  ETERNAL  COMMUNION  177 

ments  could  be  preserved,  and  the  rest  strained  off,  none  of 
us  could  wish  for  anything  better.  And  just  as  these  mo- 
ments of  joy  or  elevation  may  fill  our  ovv^n  lives,  so,  too,  they 
may  be  prolonged  in  the  experience  of  our  friends,  and,  ex- 
ercising their  power  in  those  lives,  may  know  a  continual 
resurrection.  ...  If  what  I  have  written  seems  unreal  to 
you  and  fantastic,  at  least  there  is  one  thing  with  which  you'll 
agree.  The  will  to  serve  is  in  both  of  us,  and  you  approve 
of  what  I  am  doing.  Now  that  is  just  one  of  the  true  and 
vital  things  that  must  not  be,  and  is  not,  exhausted  by  the 
moment  at  which  it  is  felt  or  expressed.  My  resolution  can 
live  on  in  yours,  even  if  I  am  taken,  and,  in  your  refusal 
to  regret  what  we  know  to  have  been  a  right  decision,  it 
can  prove  itself  undefeated  by  death." 

Thus,  a  young  man,  about  to  die,  seeks  to  com- 
fort his  mother  by  pointing  her  to  the  very  same 
truth  to  which  I.  am  trying  to  lead  your  hearts.  For 
the  most  part  his  letters  are  radiantly  happy,  like 
the  man  who  would  be  a  philosopher,  but  cheerful- 
ness would  always  be  breaking  in.  Of  course,  he 
does  not  use  the  phrases  of  religion,  albeit  the  truth 
is  the  same.  If  one  wishes  it  clothed  in  the  language 
of  the  altar  he  can  do  no  better  than  turn  to  that 
golden  little  book  which  to  Luther  was  second  only 
to  the  Bible  in  which  he  found,  in  his  hour  of  darkest 
tribulation,  "a  certain  truth" — the  truth  indeed  which 
made  his  what  he  was:  ^  If  you  wish  to  trace  this 
certain  truth — not  esoteric  at  all,  but  translucently 
lovely  and  richly  human — you  will  find  it  in  the  open- 
ing paragraphs  of  Luther's  treatise.  The  Freedom 

*  Theologica  Germanica. 


178  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

of  a  Christian  Man.  The  little  book  to  which  I  refer 
is,  of  course,  a  book  of  mysticism,  and  it  has  come 
down  to  us  dateless  and  authorless;  fittingly  so,  be- 
cause it  is  an  eternal  book.  It  may  well  have  been 
the  meditations  of  some  deep-hearted  woman — some 
clear-visioned  Monica — in  a  cloister  or  by  a  hearth, 
researching  the  deep  things  of  God  in  a  circle  of 
Quaker-like  friends.  Or  it  may  have  been  the 
reverie  of  some  obscure  saint  whom  the  angel  of  re- 
nunciation had  set  upon  the  pinnacle  of  the  minster  to 
peer  into  the  lore  of  Eternity,  or  from  the  holy 
heights  of  humility  to  ponder  the  piteous  supplication 
of  the  human  heart.  It  is  a  simple  book,  telling  us 
once  more  of  the  ancient,  incessant  need  of  purifica- 
tion, the  futility  of  evasions,  and  the  divine  harmony 
won  by  prayer,  discipline  and  service.  As  we  may 
read : 

"I  would  fain  be  to  the  Eternal  Goodness  what  his  own 
hand  is  to  a  man.  As  soon  as  a  man  turneth  himself  in 
spirit  and  with  his  whole  heart  and  mind  entereth  into  the 
nature  of  God,  which  is  above  all  time,  all  that  he  ever 
lost  is  restored  in  a  moment.  And  if  a  man  were  to  do 
this  a  thousand  times  in  each  day,  each  time  a  real  and  fresh 
union  would  take  place.  And  in  this  sweet  and  divine  act 
standeth  the  truest  and  fullest  union  that  may  be  in  this 
present  time.  For  he  that  hath  attained  thereto  asketh  noth- 
ing further,  for  he  hath  found  the  kingdom  of  heaven  and 
eternal  life  on  earth." 

After  this  manner  a  wise  teacher  of  the  heart 
seeks  to  show  us  how  near  the  divinest  things  are 


THE  ETERNAL  COMMUNION  179 

to  us,  what  the  eternal  life  is,  and  how  we  may  live 
it  here  in  the  midst  of  these  tangled  days.  God  is 
here;  eternity  is  now.  When  we  live  for  divine 
things  we  enter  into  the  life  of  God  In  whom  live 
the  spirits  of  those  who  have  left  us.  No  matter 
where  we  are — on  the  battlefield,  on  the  sea,  at 
home  or  far  away,  in  the  city  or  in  the  field — as  often 
as  we  turn  our  minds  and  hearts  to  Him  we  partake 
of  this  Eternal  Communion.  Again  let  me  draw  my 
example  from  the  war,  which  has  made  so  many  real 
things  seem  unreal,  and  so  many  unreal  things  most 
real,  rewarding,  and  redeeming.  Some  of  you  may 
have  seen  a  tiny  book  of  verse  called  The  Heavenly 
Tavern,  which  the  following  lines  make  worth  pos- 
sessing, if  it  held  no  others : 

"Here,  in  the  No-man's  land  and  in  the  dark, 
By  evil  chance  hard  hit,  dying  alone 
I  lie,  and  the  pain  shifts  from  limb  to  limb. 
Pain  o'  the  body,  durable  enough.  ... 
But  now  that  pain  merges  itself  at  last 
In  one  great  longing  for  some  human  voice 
'Mid  this  inhuman  din  of  warfare  loud; 
Some  human  voice,  symbol  of  lasting  bond 
That  joins  me  close  to  every  human  soul 
And  drives  this  loneliness  away  from  me.  .  .  . 
Now  through  the  darkness  and  the  pain  a  Voice — 
*Ye  are  My  Body  closely  joined  to  Me 
And  to  each  other ;  and  in  yonder  world 
Banished  be  loneliness  and  dreadful  fear 
Of  solitude.     Feed  on  My  presence  now.' 
And  at  the  word  I  stretch  my  wounded  hand, 


180  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

Unthinkingly,  it  seems,  and  there  beneath 

My  finger  feel  the  three  short  blades  of  grass.  .  .  . 

May  this  Thy  Body  be  and  this  Thy  Blood.  .  .  , 

There  on  my  tongue  my  sacrament  lies  safe. 

So,  God,  Thy  Presence  comes;  and  though  I  die, 

I  do  not  die  alone.     Rushingly  comes 

The  sound  of  myriad  voices  in  mine  ear 

Like  falling  water;  and  my  place  awaits 

Me  there.     So  as  I  chew  the  blades  of  grass 

I  know  that  all  is  well,  and  my  small  soul 

Goes,  'companied  with  many  greater  souls. 

To  where,  as  at  some  heavenly  tavern  fair, 

I  greet  my  friends.  .  .  . 

I  thank  Thee  for  Thy  blades  of  grass, 

My  Eucharist  to  me  in  loneliness." 

Even  so,  across  the  strange  deeps  and  distances 
of  death,  he  is  united  in  the  Eternal  Communion 
of  all  the  brave  and  true-hearted,  and  finds  fellow- 
ship. The  experience  here  realised  by  the  poet  is 
far  more  real  than  the  din  and  thunder  of  battle. 
It  is  what  Jesus  meant  by  the  Eternal  Life,  which 
does  not  begin  at  death,  but  here  and  now — as  the 
sky  begins  at  the  top  of  the  ground.  Indeed,  if 
we  follow  His  way,  what  men  call  death  will  be 
seen  in  its  true  light — a  cloud-shadow  wandering 
across  our  human  valley.  Jesus  lived  by  "the  power 
of  an  endless  life,"  the  eternal  contemporary  of 
all  souls  that  love  God  and  serve  His  name,  talking 
with  Moses  and  Elijah  on  the  Mount  of  Vision.  Out 
of  that  eternal  realm  He  spoke  in  the  text,  "Before 
Abraham  was,  I  am."   Into  that  world  where  we  are 


THE  ETERNAL  COMMUNION  181 

free  from  the  tyranny  of  time  He  seeks  to  lead  us, 
adding  a  new  dimension  to  our  lives  which  are  so 
brief  at  their  longest,  so  broken  at  their  best.  Oh, 
let  us  lay  hold  of  Eternal  Life  in  Him,  and  we  shall 
know  of  a  truth  that  our  little  lives  are 

A  part  of  one  great  strength 
That  moves  and  cannot  die. 


THE  UNBOUND  CHRIST 

"The  time  is  at  hand."— Rev.  i.  3. 

IN  his  recent  book,  The  Divine  Aspect  of  History, 
Mr.  Mozley  has  this  striking  and  suggestive  re- 
mark: "With  the  death  of  Jesus  our  earthly  life  for 
the  first  time  struck  root  in  the  fields  of  eternity." 
Not  for  the  first  time,  surely,  but  more  deeply,  more 
clearly,  and  therefore  more  fruitfully.  Something 
Jesus  had  which  the  prophets  only  sought  and  fore- 
told; a  seed  which  He  implanted,  or  evoked,  which 
has  grown  a  richer  harvest  since  He  lived,  and  be- 
cause He  still  lives.  Of  this  new  divine  life,  strik- 
ing deeper  root  in  the  fields  of  time,  the  Book  of 
Revelation  is  an  interpretation,  an  unfolding:  it  is 
a  Fifth  Gospel — the  Gospel  of  the  Eternal  Christ. 

It  is  a  Christian  Apocalypse — that  is,  an  attempt 
to  expound,  or  body  forth  in  symbols  the  meaning 
and  final  issues  of  the  revelation  of  Jesus  Christ.  Its 
primary  purpose  is  not  so  much  to  predict  as  to 
interpret.  Like  the  Hebrew  prophets,  the  writer  is 
thinking  most  of  the  present  needs  of  those  for  whom 
he  writes,  who  were  living  in  the  cloudy  sunset  of 
an  epoch.  But,  in  interpreting  the  spiritual  signi- 
ficance of  his  own  age,  he  furnished  the  Church  with 
the  key  to  unlock  the  secrets  of  every  age;  for  the 
spiritual    forces    behind    all    ages    are    the    same. 

182 


THE  UNBOUND  CHRIST  18S 

Throughout  the  book  human  history  Is  regarded 
from  the  standpoint  of  the  eternal  world,  as  if  the 
writer  were  standing  outside  the  time-order  looking 
down  upon  the  pageant.  History  is  seen  to  be  a 
contest  between  spiritual  forces,  of  which  the  earth 
is  the  battle-ground:  and  if  evil  often  seems  to  be 
stronger,  it  is  doomed  to  defeat  in  the  end. 

There  is  a  certain  order  in  the  book,  but  it  is  not 
chronological.  Its  visions  overlap  and  blend,  like 
the  dissolving  views  of  a  cinema,  and  are  less  a  series 
of  events  than  a  series  of  pictures,  often  strange  and 
terrible,  but  sometimes  lovely  and  grand,  of  the  di- 
vine judgment  working  itself  out  in  history.  The  in- 
dications of  time  in  the  book  are  not  to  be  taken  liter- 
ally; they  are  a  part  of  its  symbolism.  No  attempt 
is  made  to  foretell  the  length  of  the  Christian  dispen- 
sation; all  the  writer  can  see  is  that  the  conflict  be- 
tween the  Church  and  the  world  will  go  on,  and  be- 
come more  intense  as  the  end  draws  near — but  the 
victory  of  spiritual  forces  is  sure.  Three  things 
stand  out  distinctly,  and  should  be  kept  in  mind: 

First,  that  God  is  working  out  His  purpose  in  all 
history,  even  In  the  darkest  times  of  perplexity  and 
evil.  World-empires  may  defy  Him  for  a  moment, 
but  their  triumph  is  a  brief  prelude  to  disaster. 

Second,  the  goal  of  human  history  is  the  final 
triumph  of  Christ:  a  victory  to  be  achieved,  as  the 
writer  sees  it,  not  so  much  by  the  gradual  improve- 
ment of  society  as  by  the  intervention  of  God.  If 
there  is  a  law  of  growth  and  unfolding,  there  is  also 
a  Law  of  Catastrophe. 


184  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

Third,  the  Church  must  never  on  any  account, 
no  matter  what  the  temptation,  compromise  with 
the  evil  spirit  of  the  world,  lest  by  purchasing  such 
favour  she  betray  her  Master. 

Such  Is  the  ordinary  outline  of  the  spirit  and  pur- 
pose of  the  book,  but  some  of  us  are  not  satisfied 
with  it.  Unfortunately,  as  matters  now  stand,  not 
a  few  who  try  to  read  the  book  find  it  to  be  anything 
but  a  Book  of  Revelation.  They  go  to  it  expecting 
a  disclosure,  as  the  title  Indicates,  and  come  away 
confused.  They  discover  good  counsel,  some  be- 
jewelled passages,  and  stanzas  of  haunting  beauty 
and  comfort,  but  they  feel  that  there  has  been  no 
actual  revelation.  The  imagery  is  alien,  the  pictures 
seem  more  fanciful  than  real;  and  In  looking  through 
Its  strange  art  gallery  they  find  more  to  bewilder  than 
to  enlighten.  Some  one  said  that  the  book,  if  it  did 
not  find  him  crazy,  left  him  so.  Luther  declined  to 
expound  It.  So  did  Calvin,  and  it  had  been  better  if 
certain  others  had  followed  their  example.  Alas  I 
this  golden  book  has  fallen  into  the  hands  of  the 
puzzle-maker  and  the  prophecy-monger,  to  whom  it 
Is  a  divine  almanac,  and  whose  exegesis  is  as  Ingenu- 
ous as  it  is  absurd.  It  has  been  used  as  a  kind  of 
cryptogram  to  prove  when  the  world  is  coming  to  an 
end,  as  if  that  were  startling  information.  Of  course, 
the  world  Is  always  coming  to  an  end,  and  always  be- 
ginning again,  and  so  it  will  be  till  the  end  be  ended. 
One  recalls  the  remark  of  Emerson  to  one  of  these 
apostles,  who  told  him  that  the  world  was  about  to  be 


THE  UNBOUND  CHRIST  185 

burned  up:     "Never  mind,  never  mind;  we  can  get 
along  without  it." 

The  question  of  the  authorship  of  the  Apocalypse 
need  not  detain  us.  If  it  was  not  written  by  St. 
John  the  Divine,  it  was  the  work  of  some  master 
mind  who  interpreted  his  faith  and  vision  in  the 
early  time,  as  Browning  did  in  our  own  day  in  "The 
Death  in  the  Desert."  Pursued  by  the  foes  of  his 
faith,  St.  John  took  refuge  in  a  cave  in  the  desert, 
where  his  mortal  hour  came  upon  him.  As  the  end 
approached,  in  rapt  prophetic  vision  he  foresaw,  with 
his  bright  dying  eyes,  all  the  subtle  attacks  on  the 
faith  of  Jesus,  and  disarmed  them — as  Tennyson  in 
"In  Memoriam"  forfeit  and  fought  out  in  advance 
the  spiritual  battles  of  the  next  sixty  years.  The 
teaching  of  David  Strauss,  at  whose  touch  all  things 
turned  to  allegory;  the  unctuous  and  persuasive  doubt 
of  Renan,  in  which  one  hears  always  an  echo  of 
irony;  these,  and  the  ruder  forms  of  denial,  the  dying 
seer  predicted  and  refuted.  Let  men  deny  what 
dogmas  they  will,  let  them  tear  the  Gospel  record  to 
tatters,  they  do  not  so  much  as  touch  the  basis  of 
faith  as  Browning  states  it  in  that  poem;  and  he  is 
true  to  the  faith  and  vision  of  St.  John. 

Let  us  assume,  then,  that  the  Apocalypse  was  writ- 
ten either  by  St.  John  or  by  his  inspiration,  and  see 
if  we  can  find  the  key  to  its  interpretation.  St.  John 
was  the  only  one  of  the  Apostles  who  died  a  natural 
death;  all  the  others  suffered  martyrdom  in  one  form 
or  another — ^but  the  Beloved  Disciple  lived  to  the 
great  age  of  ninety,  his  gospel  summed  up  in  the  say- 


186  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

ing,  "Little  children,  love  one  another."  When  he 
was  very  old  and  bowed  with  sorrow  he  was  banished 
to  the  Isle  of  Patmos  and  made  to  work  in  the 
quarries.  But  that  was  not  the  worst  hardship  that 
befell  him.  Darkness  seemed  to  settle  over  the 
world,  and  at  Patmos  the  message  came  that  Peter 
and  Andrew  had  been  put  to  death,  and  that  the  little 
Church  which  he  had  planted  at  Ephesus  had  been 
broken  up  by  persecution.  Other  groups  of  disciples 
had  been  driven  by  the  wind  and  scattered.  Every- 
thing seemed  lost.  Besides  the  holy  city  of  Jerusalem 
had  been  captured  and  destroyed,  and  with  the  fall 
of  the  Temple  the  world  seemed  to  be  falling  to 
pieces. 

Such  was  the  setting  of  the  Apocalypse,  with  Its 
many  windows  of  vision  opening,  not  Into  the  Past, 
not  Into  the  Future,  but  into  the  hidden,  eternal  Pres- 
ent; and  the  aged  Apostle  was  shown  that  the  Church 
does  not  depend  on  Peter,  Paul,  Andrew,  or  John, 
but  upon  the  eternal  Christ,  who  Is  alive  for  ever 
more.  It  Is  a  vision  vouchsafe  to  a  soldier  of  right- 
eousness, an  apostle  of  love,  sustaining  his  faith  and 
fortifying  his  spirit.  No  matter  how  we  may  Inter- 
pret it,  glibly  as  the  psychologist  too  often  does,  or 
reverently  and  profoundly  as  Maurice  did,  surely 
it  Is  proof  of  two  things — first,  the  power  of  the  seer 
to  go  beyond  the  historian,  to  rise  above  the  storms 
and  disasters  of  history  and  read  their  meaning  from 
above  downward;  and  second,  the  all-conquering,  all- 
transfiguring  power  of  Christian  faith,  and  its  far- 
shining  Insight  which  sees  the  final  victory  of  Christ. 


THE  UNBOUND  CHRIST  187 

Here  Is  the  message  of  the  Book  of  Vision  to  us  to- 
day, living  as  we  are  in  a  time  of  world-crisis  and  up- 
heaval like  that  in  which  it  was  written,  and  we  need 
to  recover  that  message — or,  better  still,  that  faith 
■ — for  our  comfort  and  courage.  In  recent  years 
there  has  been  a  strong  tendency  to  go  back  to  the 
Christ  of  long  ago;  but  what  we  need  in  the  con- 
fusions of  our  day  is  a  sense  of  the  Living  Christ. 
It  Is  not  a  question  as  to  the  coming  of  Christ,  but 
that  He  is  here,  that  we  need  to  grasp. 

Truly,  the  Apocalypse  is  a  fifth  Gospel,  and  the 
faith  and  spirit  of  this  Gospel  Is  essential  to  an  un- 
derstanding of  the  other  four  Gospels.  Matthew, 
Mark,  Luke,  and  John  show  us,  from  different 
angles,  the  Christ  of  Palestine,  lovely,  winning, 
heroic,  tormented,  but  at  last  triumphant — paint- 
ing the  picture  with  Incomparable  art  upon  a  simple 
canvas.  But  in  the  fifth  Gospel  we  are  shown  the 
Living  and  Eternal  Christ  upon  a  background  of 
clashing  armies,  shouting  hosts,  and  burning  cities, 
as  If  the  seer-like  artist  had  dipped  his  brush  in 
earthquake  and  eclipse,  and  the  shadows  of  the  bot- 
tomless pit,  using  crags  and  mountains,  clouds  and 
seas,  to  supplement  his  art.  Here  is  the  Christ,  not 
only  of  the  four  Gospels,  but  of  the  four  corners  of 
the  earth;  the  "Christ  of  the  militant  kingdom  and 
the  kingdom  of  peace;  the  Christ  of  war  and  pesti- 
lence and  disaster,  as  well  as  of  holiness  and  of 
blessedness.  It  is  the  Christ  of  Christian  history, 
not  the  glorified  Christ,  or  the  ascended  Christ,  but 


188         THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

the  Christ  of  to-day."  ^  Here  His  movements  are 
not  along  the  stony  paths  of  Judea,  but  in  vast  ranges 
of  mind,  in  long  stretches  of  time,  in  stupendous  over- 
turnings  of  history. 

It  is  a  portrayal,  a  foreshadowing,  an  interpreta- 
tion of  Christ  Unbound,  released  and  set  free  to 
mingle  in  the  life  of  the  world  in  whose  contests 
and  tragedies  the  will  of  God  is  being  wrought  out. 
There  is  much  to  remind  us  of  Prometheus  Unbound, 
by  Shelley,  one  using  the  background  of  Greek  re- 
ligion and  the  other  the  scenery  of  Jewish  apoca- 
lypse with  its  fantastic  imagery,  much  of  which,  no 
doubt,  was  designed  to  heighten  the  colouring  of  the 
great  picture.  Indeed,  the  parallelism  between  the 
Crucified  One  and  Prometheus  nailed  to  the  cliff  is 
very  striking,  and  one  feels  that  Shelley  was  richly 
indebted  to  the  Apocalypse,  and  that  his  poem  is 
more  Christian  than  Greek.  There  is  no  need  to  say 
that  the  Apocalypse  is  not  only  truer,  but  pro- 
founder,  as  it  is  more  august  and  awful  in  its  imagery. 
Also,  its  imagery  is  entirely  in  keeping  with  the  sub- 
limity of  the  vision,  the  writer  having  exhausted 
heaven  and  earth,  almost,  in  his  effort  to  set  forth 
"that  unfinished  life  which  shapes  the  world." 

Never  was  there  such  a  chamber  of  imagery,  if 
once  we  grasp  the  key  to  it.  Death  and  hell,  light- 
nings and  thunders,  hail  and  fire  mingle  with  blood, 
darkened  suns,  stars  cast  like  unripe  figs,  the  sky 
rolled  up  like  a  scroll,  mountains  uprooted,  the  pit 

^  The   Unexplored  Self,  by  G.   R.   Montgomery.     Chapter  VII., 
to  which  this  sermon  is  indebted. 


THE  UNBOUND  CHRIST  189 

of  the  abyss  opened,  plagues,  the  sickle  of  diseases, 
horrors  by  day  and  horrors  by  night,  metals  gleam- 
ing in  a  furnace,  a  sea  of  glass  clear  as  crystal,  the 
whiteness  of  snow,  many  radiant  jewels,  the  tree  of 
life,  seven-headed,  ten-horned  beasts,  agonies  unutter- 
able, diadems  of  victory,  the  throne  of  God,  judg- 
ment, voices  like  the  sound  of  many  waters  of  heaven- 
ly hosts,  choruses,  hallelujahs — how  strange  it  all 
is  to  our  eyes  and  ears,  and  how  confusing  at  first! 
Yet,  when  we  see  the  central  Figure  of  the  scene,  now 
a  King,  now  a  Child,  and  always  a  Lamb  slain  in 
eternal  sacrifice,  one  feels  that  it  might  have  been 
written  yesterday.  Surely  no  book  of  the  Bible  has 
more  to  say  to  us  to-day  than  the  solemn  Book  of 
Vision,  shutting  up  its  scenes,  as  Milton  said,  be- 
tween the  stillness  of  heavenly  silence  and  the  echoes 
of  Divine  symphonies. 

If  the  Apocalypse  closes  the  Bible,  it  opens  the 
book  of  the  world,  translating  "Christ  into  the 
vocabulary  of  the  larger  efforts,  the  race  problems, 
the  social  achievements"  of  history.  It  is  the  only 
fitting  close  of  the  Bible,  being  a  vision  neither  of 
things  past  nor  of  future  things,  but  of  the  eternal 
present.  The  Babylon  of  the  book  is  neither  Rome 
nor  the  city  of  the  Euphrates.  It  is  any  centre  of  re- 
bellion light.  It  is  London.  It  is  Paris.  It  is  New 
York.  The  beast  with  seven  heads  and  ten  horns 
is  not  Caesar  alone.  It  is  the  unscrupulous  Man  of 
Power  in  every  age,  in  every  land.  He  may  be  a 
monarch,  a  millionaire,  or  a  demagogue.  The  Christ 
whose  presence  is  the  glory  of  the  book  is  the  im- 


190  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

manent  Christ,  in  whom  the  human  and  the  Divine 
blend — mighty,  but  merciful,  His  word  sharper  than 
a  two-edged  sword,  yet  redeeming,  His  face  as  the 
sun  shining  in  splendour,  His  voice  like  music.  Some- 
times He  is  riding  a  red  horse,  sometimes  a  black, 
horse,  and  at  last  the  white  horse  of  conquest — victor 
over  all  that  is  untrue,  unclean,  and  unjust  by  "that 
strange  power  called  weakness." 

Such,  in  outline  is  the  fifth  Gospel,  and  we  need 
to  read  it  to-day  in  the  flash  and  glare  and  thunder 
of  world-tragedy,  that  so  we  may  learn  to  see  in 
Mammonism,  Materialism,  and  Militarism  the  old 
enemies  of  the  Christ,  and  in  the  immeasurable  sacri- 
fice of  our  race  an  unveiling  of  that  spirit,  that  prin- 
ciple, in  which  lies  our  hope  and  healing.  If  we  take 
this  Book  of  Vision  to  heart,  it  will  teach  us  to  see 
the  Eternal  Christ  moving  amid  the  shadows  and 
horrors  of  our  time.  His  truth  the  only  hope  of  our 
humanity  to-day,  to-morrow,  and  for  ever.  Even 
so,  come,  Lord  Jesus! 


TWO  OR  THREE  AND  JESUS 

"Where  two  or  three  are  gathered  together  in  My  name, 
there  am  I  in  the  midst  of  them." — Matt,  xviii.  20. 

SURELY  no  promise  in  the  Bible  is  more  pre- 
cious than  that  contained  in  this  text,  and  none 
has  been  more  often  fulfilled.  How  many  'memories 
it  brings  back  to  me  from  across  the  years !  Out  on 
the  prairies  of  the  Far  West  there  were  not  many  of 
us  when  the  neighbourhood  assembled,  as  its  custom 
was,  for  the  weekly  service  of  prayer.  Some  of  them 
had  to  ride  for  miles  to  be  present,  but  they  seldom 
failed.  Then  some  old  saint  would  offer  prayer,  in 
which  he  rarely  forgot  to  give  thanks  for  the  promise 
of  the  Master  that  where  two  or  three  were  gathered 
together  in  His  name  there  He  would  be  in  their 
midst.  And  that  promise  was  fulfilled,  as  we  all  felt 
when  we  turned  our  steps  homeward  refreshed  and 
exalted,  having  learned  once  more  that  "in  fellow- 
ship religion  has  its  founts," 

Forgive  me  for  recalling  another  memory  which 
clings  to  this  text.  In  the  front  yard  of  our  home 
there  stood  a  great  old  tree,  under  which  some  who 
are  fallen  asleep  were  wont  to  sit  on  Sabbath  after- 
noons and  talk  of  the  things  of  the  soul.  Nearly 
always  they  had  their  Bibles  open  in  their  laps,  and 
sometimes  they  would  argue   a  point  of  doctrine, 

191 


192  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

More  often,  however,  their  talk  was  of  the  inner  life 
and  its  revealings  and  the  things  they  had  learned  in 
the  school  of  Christ.  Some  of  their  interpretations 
of  Scripture  texts,  especially  of  the  Parables  and 
Prophecies,  were  no  doubt  fantastic.  As  examples 
of  exegesis  they  would  hardly  pass  muster  among 
scholars,  but  as  overflowings  of  the  poetry  of  faith 
they  had  a  rich  beauty.  How  good  it  was  for  a  lad 
to  listen  to  that  talk  under  the  old  tree,  and  to-day 
he  is  willing  to  forgive  all  errors  of  that  humble 
exegesis  in  gratitude  for  a  home  of  faith — as  he  for- 
gives all  the  allegories  of  the  Fathers  of  the  Church. 
It  recalls  a  page  in  Grace  Abounding,  in  which  Bun- 
yan  tells  of  a  day  he  could  never  forget: 

"Upon  a  day  the  good  providence  of  God  called  me  to 
Bedford  to  work  at  my  calling,  and  in  one  of  the  streets 
of  that  town  I  came  where  there  were  three  or  four  poor 
women  sitting  at  a  door  in  the  sun,  talking  about  the  things 
of  God.  Being  now  willing  to  hear  their  discourse,  I  drew 
near  to  hear  what  they  said,  for  I  was  now  a  brisk  talker 
in  matters  of  religion.  But  they  were  far  beyond  me.  Their 
talk  was  about  a  new  birth,  the  work  of  God  in  their 
hearts.  They  talked  how  God  had  visited  their  souls  with 
His  love  in  the  Lord  Jesus,  and  with  what  words  and  prom- 
ises they  were  refreshed,  comforted,  and  supported.  And 
methought  they  spake  with  such  pleasantness  of  Scripture 
language,  and  with  such  an  appearance  of  grace  in  all  they 
said,  that  they  were  to  me  as  if  they  had  found  a  new  world 
— as  if  they  were  people  who  dwelt  alone." 

How  beautiful,  yet  how  far  away  it  all  seems — 
almost  as  remote  as  my  mother  and  her  friends  under 


TWO  OR  THREE  AND  JESUS  193 

the  old  tree  five  thousand  miles  away.  Why  do  we 
not  have  such  talk,  in  our  day?  Why  are  we  so 
reticent,  so  uncommunicative,  so  shy  in  respect  of  the 
inner  life  of  faith?  Is  it  because  we  have  nothing 
to  talk  about,  because  we  have  no  "dealing"  in  these 
matters,  as  Silas  Marner  would  say?  Or  is  it  due 
to  an  unsettlement  of  faith  which  makes  us  less  cer- 
tain, and  therefore  less  talkative,  than  our  fathers 
were  ?  True,  the  art  of  conversation  has  suffered  sad 
decline  since  Johnson,  Burke,  and  Boswell  held  high 
discourse  in  London  town.  Is  that  the  reason  for 
our  dumbness?  Perhaps,  in  part;  but  on  other  sub- 
jects we  find  our  tongues  and  use  them  with  some 
skill.  Whatever  the  reason  may  be,  some  of  us  miss 
such  talk  as  that  under  the  old  tree  whose  leaves  still 
rustle  in  my  memory.  Indeed,  the  religious  loneli- 
ness of  our  time  is  appalling.  Never  were  human 
bodies  so  jostled  in  street  and  mart;  never  were  hu- 
man souls  so  strangely  alone. 

At  first  thought  the  idea  of  comradeship  in  the 
life  of  the  spirit  may  seem  like  a  contradiction. 
That  life  is  so  inward,  so  individual,  so  separate,  so 
shut  within  the  privacy  of  the  soul,  that  we  shrink 
from  trying  to  share  it.  Even  St.  Bernard  was  wont 
to  advise  every  one  to  have  these  words  written  in 
large  letters  over  his  room :  "My  secret  to  myself." 
Yet  no  one  ever  poured  out  the  riches  of  his  inner 
life  in  a  more  prodigal  profusion  than  did  St.  Ber- 
nard, in  whose  sermons  on  the  Love  of  God  we  may 
read  one  of  the  highest  romances  in  the  history  of 
faith.    While  each  one  may  have  his  unspoken  secret, 


194  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

it  is  also  true  that  no  one  knows  the  ways  of  the  Spirit 
in  his  own  soul  who  knows  only  his  own  soul.  The 
highest  fruits  of  the  life  of  the  spirit  ripen  in  fellow- 
ship, and  he  misses  this  fruition  who  keeps  his  ex- 
perience in  separateness  from  his  fellows.  Lack  of 
tact,  to  be  sure,  is  fatal  in  any  field.  Men  resent  any 
effort  to  intrude  upon  the  privacy  of  the  soul.  "The 
soul  of  our  brother  is  a  dark  forest,"  says  a  Russian 
proverb,  and  we  must  respect  its  veiled  and  shadowy 
mystery.  Still,  there  is  no  excuse  for  our  strange 
shyness  in  speaking  of  the  truths  that  make  us  men. 
Surely,  as  between  utter  aloofness  and  an  intru- 
sive familiarity,  we  can  find  a  happy  mean  of  gra- 
cious, genial,  spiritual  fellowship;  frank,  open,  and 
forthright  in  our  talk  of  the  things  of  faith.  Imagine 
a  company  of  friends  assembled  in  a  spirit  befitting 
such  an  adventure,  each  one  telling  what  he  actually 
believes,  not  what  he  thinks  he  ought  to  believe,  or 
is  expected  to  believe.  The  result  would  be  startling 
at  first,  but  it  would  make  for  mutual  understanding 
and  regard.  Why  cannot  groups  of  kindred  souls 
gather,  no  one  trying  to  convert  another,  none  taking 
toward  the  others  any  superior  attitude,  and  talk  of 
what  is  in  their  hearts,  like  my  dear  old  friends  under 
the  tree?  We  do  this  in  other  concerns,  why  not  do 
it  in  the  name  of  the  highest  interests  of  life?  My 
point,  as  you  will  see,  is  far-reaching  in  its  possibili- 
ties, the  while  it  points  to  a  grave  defect  in  our 
modern  religious  life.  In  our  impatience  to  be  doing 
everything  at  once  and  by  wholesale  we  have  for- 


TWO  OR  THREE  AND  JESUS  195 

gotten  a  very  important  factor  in  the  progress  of 
faith  and  the  teaching  of  truth. 

First  the  man,  then  the  group,  then  the  multitude 
— that  is  the  order  of  advance,  whether  the  truth  to 
be  taught  be  one  of  art,  of  politics,  or  of  religion. 
Take  such  a  group  as  gathered  at  Alfoxden,  when 
William  and  Dorothy  Wordsworth  lived  in  daily 
fellowship  with  Coleridge.  Who  can  doubt  that 
where  those  two  or  three  were  gathered  in  happy 
comradeship  the  spirit  of  poetry  was  present  in 
power?  No  one  can  read  the  Journal  of  Dorothy 
and  doubt  that  she  had  a  part,  and  no  small  part, 
in  the  Lyrical  Ballads.  Not  only  are  two  heads 
better  than  one;  they  are  better  than  two.  Out 
of  their  union  there  comes,  somehow,  a  something 
larger  and  wiser  and  deeper  than  either  of  them 
possesses  alone.  •  That  little  band  of  Pre-Raphaelite 
artists  in  England,  led  by  Rossetti  and  Ruskin,  were 
wont  to  meet  often  to  admire,  criticise,  and  help  each 
other.  After  a  time  the  public  began  to  see  some- 
thing common  in  their  work,  a  new  kind  of  beauty. 
When  attacked,  they  stood  together,  and  left  an 
unfading  mark  on  English  art.  Darwin,  Huxley, 
and  a  few  friends  wrought  out  the  idea  of  evolution 
in  science,  and  then  fought  it  out  in  the  forum;  as 
Socrates,  long  before,  gave  his  thought  to  a  band  of 
young  Greeks,  and  through  them  to  the  world.  In 
my  own  country  Emerson,  Lowell,  Holmes,  and  their 
cluster  of  friends  were  called  *'a  mutual  admiration 
society,"  because  they  knew  the  uses  and  value  of  the 
group. 


196  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

Always  it  is  so.  If  a  man  has  a  vision  of  truth 
he  draws  a  few  kindred  spirits  into  the  circle  of  its 
radiance,  and  they  test  his  insight  while  sharing 
it.  They  supplement  his  limitations,  and  in  that  way 
he  discovers  the  meaning  of  his  own  discovery. 
Intimate  fellowship  is  needed  if  men  are  to  think 
things  through,  and  intimate  fellowship  is  limited. 
High  truth  cannot  be  mastered  except  by  those  bound 
together  by  a  bond  too  close  to  admit  the  many. 
Within  that  circle,  with  all  the  give-and-take  of 
friends,  there  need  be  no  reserve,  no  fear  of  misun- 
derstanding, no  dread  of  extravagance.  There  a 
man  may  paint  with  a  bold  brush  and  be  understood; 
he  may  use  the  language  of  exaggeration  which  is 
often  the  best  exegesis  of  thought;  he  is  not  bound  to 
go  back  at  every  turn  to  first  principles — they  are  as- 
sumed. At  last,  after  a  truth  has  been  thought  out 
and  tested,  there  comes  a  time  when  they  are  ready 
to  publish  it  to  the  world  and,  if  need  be,  to  fight 
for  it.  Always  it  is  first  a  man  of  vision,  then  a 
group  made  ready  for  service,  and  then  the  heroic 
journey  in  spreading  the  truth. 

Of  course,  you  have  outrun  me  to  my  real  point, 
but  it  must  be  emphasised  none  the  less.  About  the 
Hebrew  prophets  there  gathered  little  bands  of  men 
"who  feared  God  and  spake  often  one  to  another," 
and  they  kept  the  light  aglow  in  dark  times.  Only 
a  little  band  followed  Jesus  up  and  down  the  stony 
paths  of  Judea,  and  after  His  death  waited  to  be 
endued  with  power  from  on  high — yet  what  wonders 
they  wrought!    Elect  young  spirits,  drawn  together 


TWO  OR  THREE  AND  JESUS  197 

by  the  faith  and  genius  of  St.  Paul  took  up  his  work 
and  carried  it  on  when  his  head  fell  from  the  block. 
All  down  the  ages  it  has  been  so,  from  St.  Paul  to 
St.  Francis  and  his  shining  company,  "fragrant  with 
a  wondrous  aspect."  Recall  the  five  students 
gathered  about  Wesley  in  behalf  of  a  method  of 
spiritual  culture,  and  who  came  to  be  known  as 
Methodists.  Think  of  the  group  in  the  common 
room  at  Oriel  about  the  shy  and  winsome  figure  of 
Newman — how  they  put  new  life  into  a  decaying 
Church  and  helped  to  stem  the  tide  of  crass  material- 
ism. They  were  centres  of  light,  those  groups  of 
thinking,  praying,  seeking  men  adown  the  years,  and 
their  fellowship  liberated  influences  to  which  we  can 
set  no  limit. 

Two  or  three  and  Jesus — that  has  been  the  secret 
of  power  since  the  Church  began  her  morning  march 
in  the  world,  and  so  it  must  be  to-day.  Indeed,  my 
thoughts  to-day  were  brought  to  mind  by  a  visit 
to  an  old  shrine  of  the  freedom  of  faith,  the  Pilgrim 
Church,  in  Southwark.  There,  in  1616,  as  often 
before,  a  little  shattered  band  observed  a  day  of 
fasting  and  prayer,  asking  for  light  and  leading. 
Towards  the  close  of  the  solemnity  each  renewed 
his  confession  of  faith  in  Christ,  and  then,  standing 
together,  they  joined  hands  and  covenanted  with 
God  and  one  another  to  walk  in  His  ways  as  He  had 
already  revealed,  or  should  further  make  them 
known.  And  so,  amid  desolations  caused  by  fire, 
plague,  and  persecution,  the  Church  stood,  holding 
a  principle  which,  if  it  was  ever  true,  is  true  for  ever. 


198  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

Strong  In  their  weakness,  fortified  by  prayer,  they 
could  not  be  subdued.  What  better  can  we  do  In 
this  dark  day  when  the  world  Is  shaken  with  strife 
and  "the  sons  before  their  fathers  die,"  than  to  join 
hands  and  hearts  In  a  new  covenant  of  love,  loyalty, 
and  prayer!  To-day,  If  we  gather  In  His  name,  the 
Christ  who  led  the  Pilgrim  Fathers  will  lead  their 
sons  Into  a  new  day  of  faith. 

Many  have  come  to  feel  that  the  crisis  of  to-day 
is  so  dire  that  It  can  only  be  met  by  a  divinely 
awakened  religious  life,  similar  to  the  great  move- 
ments of  the  past,  whereby  again  and  again  abuses 
were  swept  away,  and  the  Church  renewed.  Not 
a  few  think  that  such  an  awakening  is  imminent, 
and  that  one  of  its  features  will  be  that  great  social 
ideals  will  be  realised  under  religious  influences, 
bringing  a  better  social  order  and  a  deeper  life  of 
faith. ^  One  thing  is  clear:  if  there  is  to  be  such  an 
awakening,  it  will  be  felt  first  by  those  who  are 
waiting  for  it,  praying  for  it,  and  are  ready  to  re- 
ceive it.  Therefore,  if  we  would  win  from  this  war 
the  victory  we  most  need,  we  must  seek  aid  beyond 
the  power  of  man  to  give.  Like  the  pilgrims  on  the 
way  to  Emmaus,  we  walk  a  twilight  path,  reasoning 
together,  disappointed  and  sad.  The  things  that 
have  happened  fill  us  with  dismay,  and  we  need  an 
Interpreter.  Luther  used  to  apply  this  text  to  inter- 
preters and  translators  of  the  Bible,  who,  he  said, 
should  not  work  alone,  like  St.  Jerome,  but  in  com- 
pany.    Even  so  must  we  work  and  pray  and  wait  In 

*  The  Neiv  Spiritual  Impulse,  by  L.  Swetenham. 


TWO  OR  THREE  AND  JESUS  199 

company  if  we  would  interpret  the  teaching  of  events. 
Many  dark  problems  lie  ahead  of  us  demanding  to  be 
solved.  Many  points  of  view  will  be  needed,  many 
true  hearts,  but  most  of  all  the  calm,  sure  vision  that 
comes  of  fellowship  with  One  who  sees  it  all  with 
other  and  clearer  eyes  than  ours. 

For  all  these  reasons  we  need  to  recover  the  idea 
and  uses  of  the  group;  especially  does  the  Church 
need  to  do  so.  What  can  be  done  by  mass  meetings 
will  continue  to  be  done;  but  we  need  the  quiet, 
praying,  seeking  group,  where  a  few  meet  together. 
Men  go  to  a  great  assembly,  not  to  discover  truth, 
but  to  proclaim  it.  For  the  sake  of  the  multitude 
we  must  leave  it  for  a  time  and  seek  the  power  that 
comes  of  closer,  more  intimate  fellowship.  In  every 
church  there  are  a  few  who  have  the  true  spirit.  Let 
these  kindred  souls  find  each  other,  form  groups  to 
think  things  through,  to  pray  things  through,  in 
His  name,  and  the  promise  will  be  fulfilled.  Oh,  it 
is  blessedly  true  that  where  two  or  three  gather  in 
His  name,  in  His  spirit,  the  living  Christ  is  there  as 
truly  as  when  He  walked  with  men  in  days  of  old. 

Faith  hath  still  its  Olivet, 
And  love  its  Galilee. 


THE  MOTHER  OF  JESUS 

"But   Mary   kept   all    these   things,    and    pondered   them   in 
her  heart." — Luke  ii.  19. 

NOW  the  festival  of  the  birth  of  Jesus  might 
also  be  named  the  festival  of  the  Motherhood 
of  Mary — the  festival,  indeed,  of  all  motherhood. 
There  was  Mary,  as  well  as  her  Child,  in  that  pic- 
ture which  Art  loves  so  well  and  about  which  Music 
has  woven  so  many  melodies.  Gentle,  chaste,  clothed 
in  sweet  modesty,  happy  in  the  glow  of  a  new  won- 
der, yet  pensive  withal  and  brooding — how  unlike 
Diana  with  her  wiles  and  Venus  with  her  empty 
arms!  No  single  scene  has  done  more  to  touch  the 
human  heart  to  tenderness,  to  disinfect  it  of  evil,  lift- 
ing us  into  the  curve  and  mystery  of  beauty,  and 
teaching  us  to  think  of  the  home  and  the  family 
as  under  the  shadow  of  God.  Whatever  makes 
for  purity,  pity,  and  piety  is  needed  in  this  hard 
world,  if  only  to  rebuke  the  rude  cynicism  which 
befouls  the  fountains  of  life  and  degrades  what  is 
most  divine  in  human  nature. 

How  delicately  reticent,  how  exquisitely  reverent 
is  the  Gospel  record  of  the  Mother  of  Jesus!  Half 
hidden  by  a  veil  of  prayers  and  hymns,  visions,  and 
visitations— a  mere  touch  here  and  there — she  is 
obscured  from  us,  somewhat,  and  we  do  not  see  her 

209 


THE  MOTHER  OF  JESUS  201 

distinctly.  No  doubt  this  is  why  some  have  exalted 
her  beyond  measure,  and  others  have  neglected  her 
without  reason.  When  we  look  closely  at  the  narra- 
tive, putting  together  the  scattered  hints  and 
glimpses  of  Mary,  there  is  no  figure  in  the  company 
grouped  about  the  Master  more  lovely,  more  heroic, 
more  pathetic  that  His  Mother.  But  we  must  not 
think  that  her  life  was  all  one  clear  vision  that  left 
no  room  for  doubt,  no  place  for  struggle  and  mis- 
giving. Far  from  it.  That  is  to  rob  her  life  of 
reality,  making  it  a  mere  piece  of  play-acting  bereft 
of  all  adventure  of  faith.  What  is  clear  to  us  from 
the  record  was  dim  to  her  as  she  walked  her  untried 
and  difficult  path,  leading  she  knew  not  whither. 
The  narrative  as  we  have  it  was  her  interpretation 
of  her  experience,  not  a  prophetic  scroll  laid  before 
her  as  she  moved  through  the  years.  She  lived  by 
faith,  and  that  was  the  pathos  and  the  glory  of  her 
life. 

At  first  we  see  her  as  a  gentle  peasant  girl,  albeit 
of  noble  heredity,  modest  and  sweet,  pious;  pray- 
ing, no  doubt,  as  many  a  Hebrew  girl  prayed,  that 
she  might  be  the  mother  of  the  Messiah — her  mind 
steeped  In  the  poetry  of  her  people,  her  soul  attuned 
to  the  haunting  echoes  of  prophecy.  Then  we  see 
her  as  the  wife  of  a  carpenter;  and  when  her  Child 
was  born  in  a  manger  she  knew,  as  Hannah  knew, 
that  He  was  an  answer  to  prayer — knew,  what  every 
spiritually  minded  mother  knows,  that  there  Is  some- 
thing divine  behind  the  birth  of  a  child.  Her  moth- 
erly instinct,  her  poetic  Insight  put  to  shame  the  cynl- 


202  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

cal  atheism  which  sees  no  heavenly  mystery  in  the 
sacrament  of  birth.  After  the  morning  glow  came 
the  light  of  common  day,  and  we  see  Mary  the 
Mother  of  Jesus,  and  also  of  James,  and  Joses,  and 
Judas,  and  Simon,  and  the  sisters;  a  dutiful  wife,  a 
wise  mother — a  sort-tried,  often  doubting,  but  finally 
believing  woman.  Blessed  among  women  was  she, 
lovely  when  she  bent  over  the  cradle,  and  unutterably 
pathetic  when  she  stood  by  the  dark  Cross  outside 
the  city  gate. 

Few  are  the  glimpses  given  us  of  the  eighteen 
silent  years  of  boyhood,  but  they  are  enough  to 
show  us  that  Jesus  was  a  mystery  to  His  mother,  as 
he  must  be  to  every  one  else.  Of  course,  this  ex- 
perience comes  in  some  degree  to  all  mothers,  all 
parents.  Our  children  are  ours,  and  yet  not  ours. 
They  are  their  own  and  must  go  their  way  in  the 
world.  Frequently  this  makes  for  understanding, 
all  the  more  so  when  the  mystery  of  genius  is  present 
— as  we  may  read  in  that  strange,  sad  book  entitled 
Father  and  Son,  by  Edmund  Gosse.  Did  the  mother 
of  Shakespeare  understand  the  wondrous  boy  grow- 
ing up  in  her  home?  Did  the  mother  of  Dante 
know  that  she  held  in  her  arms  a  lonely  pilgrim  of 
eternity?  How  could  they?  From  the  outset,  Mary 
knew  there  was  something  mysterious  about  her  Son, 
something  which  made  a  certain  distance  between 
them — something  which  soon  or  late  was  sure  to  lead 
Him  His  own  way,  which  might  be  far  from  her 
way.  Often  He  must  have  seemed  like  a  little 
stranger  in  her  home,  aloof  even  when  she  caressed 


THE  MOTHER  OF  JESUS  203 

Him  most  fondly,  having  ideas  she  did  not  grasp, 
chambers  in  His  nature  she  did  not  enter,  and  inti- 
macies she  could  ijot  share. 

How  strikingly  this  is  shown  In  that  scene  In  the 
Temple  when  the  lost  lad — lost  to  His  parents,  but 
not  to  Himself — was  found  talking  with  the  doctors 
of  the  law.  The  Temple  was  apparently  the  last 
place  they  thought  to  look  for  Him,  which  shows 
how  little  they  knew  One  who  was  born  to  religion 
as  to  the  love  of  His  mother.  His  reply  to  their 
rebuke  had  in  it  all  the  pathos  of  His  life:  "Know 
ye  not  that  I  must  be  about  my  Father's  business?" 
They  had  misread  His  temper  and  the  tendency  of 
His  nature,  and  there  are  few  hardships  harder  than 
to  be  misunderstood  by  those  near  and  dear  to  us. 
It  puts  a  great  loneliness  round  about  us.  Yet  the 
service  of  Mary^  to  her  Son  was  ineffably  rich  and 
beautiful,  the  more  so  because  He  was  her  first-born 
into  whose  life  the  tender  tide  of  her  mother-heart 
poured.  The  tie  between  a  mother  and  her  eldest 
son  is  unique,  particular,  and  precious — doubly  so 
if  she  is  left  a  widow,  as  Mary  seems  to  have  been, 
if  we  may  trust  tradition.  Such  a  fellowship  is  deep 
and  unutterable,  and  it  leaves  something  fine  In  the 
soul  of  the  son,  blending  the  strength  of  man  with 
the  mercy  of  woman — and  the  two  together  bring 
us  near  to  God. 

Yet  no  one  can  read  the  Gospel  story  without 
seeing  that  there  was  an  estrangement  between  Jesus 
and  His  mother,  the  nature  of  which  It  Is  not  easy 
to  make  out.     It  was,  perhaps,  an  Inevitable  part 


204  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

of  the  tragedy  of  His  life.  Jesus,  we  may  be  sure, 
was  remiss  in  no  duty  to  His  mother,  but  his  nature 
was  beyond  hers  and  His  work  called  Him  afar.  If 
Joseph  died  when  Jesus  was  a  lad,  the  entire  sup- 
port of  the  home  fell  upon  Him  until  His  brothers 
were  old  enough  to  take  His  place.  Perhaps,  for 
this  reason,  the  beginning  of  His  public  ministry  was 
delayed  until  He  was  thirty  years  of  age.  When 
that  time  came  the  rift  was  felt,  and  it  widened  with 
the  years.  After  His  temptation  He  returned  to 
Nazareth  and  was  nearly  mobbed  by  His  neighbours, 
and  never  visited  the  village  again — so  far  as  we 
have  record.  Even  His  family  seem  to  have  been 
against  Him.  There  is  deep  pathos  in  the  line,  "The 
Son  of  Man  hath  not  where  to  lay  His  head."  As  if 
He  had  been  driven  away  from  His  own  home! 
More  than  once  He  repeated  the  old  proverb  that  "a 
prophet  is  not  without  honour  save  in  his  own  coun- 
try," but  He  went  further  and  added,  "and  among 
his  own  kin,  and  In  his  own  house!"  What  tragedy 
Is  here !  Nor  is  this  the  worst  of  It.  There  Is  yet 
another  scene  more  heart-breaking  still — a  scene  too 
sad  to  have  been  Invented,  and  which  we  might  have 
been  spared  but  for  the  veracity  of  the  record. 

There  was  a  day,  of  which  St.  Mark  tells,  when 
the  multitude  pressed  upon  Jesus  to  such  an  extent 
that  He  had  not  even  time  to  eat,  and  His  family, 
hearing  of  this,  went  out  to  lay  hold  of  Him;  for 
they  said,  "He  Is  beside  Himself."  They  thought 
Him  Insane,  and  His  mother  was  among  them !  How 
could    misunderstanding    go    further,    how    could 


THE  MOTHER  OF  JESUS  205 

pathos  be  more  poignant !  Hence  His  words  setting 
forth  the  higher  fellowship:  "Whosover  shall  do 
the  will  of  God,  the  same  is  my  brother  and  sister 
and  mother!"  Faith  brings  the  furthest  near,  and 
lack  of  it  leaves  the  nearest  far  off.  What  was  pass- 
ing in  the  soul  of  Mary  in  those  days  of  struggle 
and  torture  no  words  may  ever  hope  to  tell.  Some- 
one has  said  that  the  first  Gospel  of  Christ  was  that 
written  in  the  heart  of  His  mother,  but  it  took  a 
long  time  to  write  it.  Its  pages  were  blotted  with 
tears  and  blurred  with  misgivings.  When  the  news 
came  of  sick  folk  healed,  of  the  blind  restored  to 
sight,  of  the  dead  raised,  she  *'kept  these  things, 
pondering  them  in  her  heart."  But  when  rumours 
came  of  plots,  derision,  winebibbing,  gluttony,  blas- 
phemy, and  threats  of  death — how  hard  it  was  to 
keep  faith  with,  the  visions  and  voices  of  other  days. 
Like  most  women,  Mary  was  a  conformist,  and 
the  public  opinion  of  Nazareth  was  dear  to  her 
heart.  Why  could  not  her  Son  soften  His  words? 
Why  denounce  the  rulers  of  the  Church?  So  long 
as  His  teaching  was  mere  words,  it  was  not  so 
dangerous.  But  He  insisted  in  acting  it  out,  much 
to  the  scandal  of  His  family.  He  actually  set  forth 
a  faith  and  a  way  of  living  that  upset  the  stability 
of  society,  treating  outcasts  and  even  harlots  with 
kindness.  He  was  not  respectable — not  for  a  day 
of  His  life  I  If  men  of  high  position  sought  to  talk 
with  Him,  they  did  so  by  stealth  by  night,  as  Nic- 
odemus  did.  All  of  which  troubled  the  woman- 
heart  of  Mary.  Let  us  not  chide  her,  lest  we  condemn 


206  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

ourselves.  Are  we  quite  willing  to  follow  the  logic 
of  Christianity?  Are  we  brave  enough  to  obey  the 
Gospel,  in  every  page  of  which  the  seeds  of  social 
revolution  are  slumbering?  Have  we  not  said  that 
Tolstoy  and  others  of  his  kind  were  a  little  absurd 
in  taking  the  words  of  Jesus  so  seriously?  What 
Woolman  called  "the  evil  custom  of  the  world" 
makes  men  trim  the  truth  down  to  fit  the  lower  ends 
of  compromise  and  comfort.  Not  so  Jesus.  He  was 
tempted  to  do  so  in  His  battle  in  the  wilderness,  but 
spurned  all  bribes  of  easy  victory  and  temporary 
success,  and  became  the  Redeemer  of  humanity — the 
Redeemer  of  His  Mother! 

Mother  and  Son — each  walked  a  lonely  way,  often 
far  apart,  but  their  paths  drew  together  toward  the 
end.  Then  it  was  that  the  sword  pierced  her  heart, 
as  it  had  been  foretold.  She  was  in  the  Holy  City 
when  the  shadow  fell,  haunting  the  outskirts  of  the 
angry  throngs  which  clamoured  for  His  life.  She 
saw  Him  standing  crowned  with  thorns,  condemned. 
With  painful  steps  and  slow  she  followed  Him  to 
Calvary,  groping  her  way  in  the  twilight  of  tragedy 
— as  so  many  English  mothers  are  doing  to-day.  Of 
all  the  figures  that  stood  at  the  foot  of  the  Cross, 
she  was  the  most  forlorn  and  forsaken.  For  the 
politician  the  Sufferer  was  a  dangerous  agitator,  for 
the  priest  a  fanatic,  for  the  Disciples  their  beloved 
teacher;  but  for  Mary — He  was  her  Son!  Yet  even 
on  the  Cross  Jesus  did  not  forget  His  mother,  and 
made  provision  for  her  care,  asking  the  beloved 
Disciple  to  take  her  to  his  home.    No  one  else  saw 


THE  MOTHER  OF  JESUS  207 

the  Cross  as  Mary  saw  it.  The  brief,  broken,  bitter 
words  put  into  her  mouth  in  the  drama  of  "The  ter- 
rible Meek"  help  us  to  feel  her  profound,  unspeak- 
able grief.  If  the  Cross  was  the  depth  of  her  sorrow, 
who  else  received  the  first  Easter  news  with  so  wild 
a  leap  of  heart?  Amid  rumours  and  reports,  fleet- 
ing glimpses  and  whispers  of  His  voice,  what  must 
have  been  the  quivering  eagerness  of  her  heart  I 
At  last,  at  last  she  understood.  Was  ever  any  story 
stranger — how,  at  the  end,  the  Mother  of  Jesus  be- 
came a  member  of  His  Church,  humbly  trustful  of 
His  spirit,  sweetly  obedient  to  His  truth — her  Son, 
her  Saviour! 

With  right  do  we  honour  the  Mother  of  Jesus, 
linking  her  in  poetry  and  song  with  One  who  was 
her  Saviour  and  ours.  The  early  Church  called  her 
Theotokos,  Mother  of  God,  because  through  her  a 
new  hope  and  joy  had  come  into  the  hard  old  world. 
But  she  was  saved,  not  because  she  was  the  Mother 
of  the  Saviour,  but  because,  like  all  others,  she 
found  her  way  at  last  to  faith  in  His  spirit  and  His 
truth.  Salvation  is  moral,  not  magical.  As  we  can- 
not attribute  the  spiritual  supremacy  of  Jesus  to  a 
physical  fact,  no  more  can  we  think  that  Mary  was 
redeemed  by  her  motherhood.  If  any  might  boast 
after  the  flesh,  she  more !  But  those  who  enter  the 
Kingdom  are  born  not  of  the  flesh,  nor  of  the  will 
of  man,  but  of  the  will  of  God.  Mary,  like  others, 
came  to  victory  by  the  faith  that  worketh  by  love, 
by  the  obedience  that  makes  us  free,  and  the  love 
that  lifts  us  into  the  eternal  fellowship.     If  only  we 


208  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

had  record  of  the  First  Gospel,  as  it  was  written  in 
her  heart,  what  a  testimony  it  would  be,  what  a 
revelation  of  the  love  of  God  unveiled  in  the  love 
of  a  mother. 

How  long  Mary  lived  we  do  not  know.  St.  Luke 
knew  her,  and  tradition  has  it  that  he  painted  a 
picture  of  her  in  later  years.  From  no  one  else 
could  he  have  heard  the  story  of  the  Nativity  which 
he  set  down  in  his  gospel.  It  is  her  interpretation 
of  her  experience,  seen  in  the  light  thrown  back  by 
the  life  of  Jesus  upon  His  cradle  and  her  mother- 
hood— and  some  of  us  hold  that  her  insight  was 
true-  What  is  the  value  of  that  record?  For  doc- 
trine, little.  But  for  the  truth  that  is  deeper  than 
dogma,  as  deep  as  the  home  and  family,  as  deep  as 
the  heart  of  motherhood,  it  means  more  than  men 
have  ever  dreamed.  Once  we  take  it  to  heart,  it  will 
rebuke  the  false  shame  with  which  we  veil  the  beauty 
of  birth  and  the  sacrament  of  conception.  It  will 
cleanse  our  lips  of  the  rude  jest,  and  exalt  our 
minds  with  a  sense  of  the  sanctity  of  life,  purify- 
ing society  at  its  source.  Surely  this  is  what  the 
story  is  trying  to  tell  us,  and  it  could  not  be  told 
in  a  better  way,  with  more  artless  art,  with  more 
haunting  suggestion,  with  more  ineffable  beauty. 

Never  was  that  purifying  truth  more  needed  than 
to-day  when  there  is  so  much  to  belie  it.  In  nothing 
has  the  war  been  more  horrible  than  in  its  crimes 
against  motherhood,  dragging  all  the  sanctities  of 
life  down  in  blood  and  lust  and  shame.  How  ap- 
palling— indeed,   how  ghastly — is  the  contrast  be- 


THE  MOTHER  OF  JESUS  209 

tween  the  beauty  of  the  Christmas  vision  and  the 
facts  of  the  world  round  about  us!  What  wonder 
that  it  makes  us  pensive  on  a  day  dedicated  to  joy! 
One  of  our  poets  has  written  some  piercing  lines 
entitled  Trench  Thoughts,  Christmas,  1916,^  in 
which  he  tells  us  what  the  lads  are  thinking  about, 
with  a  bitter  touch  of  realism: 

"Not  of  the  shepherds  old, 

Watching  their  flocks  by  night, 
But  Father,  and  Kate  with  a  light, 
Seeing  the  cows  is  right. 

"Not  of  the  Angel  song; 

Peace  unto  men  of  Goodwill; 
Only  my  brother  Bill 
Dead,  and  he  done  no  ill! 

"Not  of  the  Heavenly  host, 

Bringing  tidings  of  great  joy; 
But  my  Mother's  homely  employ, 
And  her  prayer,  *My  boy,  my  boy !'  " 

Dark  as  the  present  is,  overcast  with  sorrow,  yet 
must  we  fight  the  good  fight,  keeping  the  faith  of 
this  high,  prophetic  day.  Our  struggle  is  for  the 
very  truths  that  make  us  men,  for  the  sanctity  of 
Mother  and  Child,  and  for  all  the  holy  things  that 
sanctify  our  human  life.  We  dare  not  let  them  go. 
When  the  vision  of  the  Ideal  fades,  life  loses  its 
meaning,   men  become   animals — and  we   are  lost. 

'  Worh-a-Day  Warriors,  by  Joseph  Lee. 


210  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

Now  as  of  old  our  hope  lies  In  the  re-birth  of  the 
Divine  in  humanity,  as  in  the  motherhood  of  Mary; 
the  incarnation  of  that  living  and  holy  Truth  to 
which  simple  shepherds  and  learned  magi  ahke  pay 
homage.  On  this  day  the  prayer  of  Christina 
Rossetti  should  be  our  own,  that  each  heart  may  be 
a  manger  for  His  birth,  and  Love  become  a  Child 
on  earth  once  more. 

"It  was  not  that  I  cared  for  Thee — 
But  Thou  didst  set  Thy  heart  upon  me, 
Even  me, 
Thy  little  one. 

Therefore  it  was  sweet  for  Thee 
To  leave  Thy  majesty  and  Throne, 

And  grow  like  me, 

A  little  one." 


THE  LITTLE  SANCTUARIES 

"Thus  saith  the  Lord  God,  Although  I  have  scattered  them 
among  the  countries,  yet  will  I  be  to  them  as  a  little  sanc- 
tuary in  the  countries  where  they  shall  come." — Ezek.  xi.  i6. 

SUPPOSE  the  City  Temple  should  be  destroyed 
to-morrow — as,  indeed,  it  may  be  any  day — 
how  many  hearts  would  be  bereaved  by  such  a  calam- 
ity? For  many  thousands  the  very  stones  of  this 
grey  old  building  are  sacred — and  London  would  be 
lonely  without  it.  Their  minds  would  be  thronged 
with  thoughts  of  days  agone,  with  memories  of  the 
multitudes  who  have  worshipped  here,  with  echoes 
of  the  sweet  voices  which  have  made  the  Gospel 
eloquent  in  so  many  keys  and  tones  and  variations 
of  emphasis,  of  insight,  and  of  temperament.  Some- 
times it  seems  to  me  that  all  those  who  have  knelt 
here  have  left  something  of  their  spirit  in  this  place 
in  return  for  what  they  receive;  and  so  through  the 
years  there  has  been  created  a  tradition  of  faith,  an 
atmosphere  of  free  and  reverent  and  forward-look- 
ing fellowship.  For  that  reason,  even  if  this  build- 
ing were  destroyed,  the  City  Temple  would  not  cease 
to  be,  because  its  image  and  influence  would  live  in 
countless  minds — each  a  little  sanctuary  bearing  its 
likeness. 

After  this  manner  we  may  realise  in  some  degree 


212  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

the  feelings  of  the  people  of  old  to  whom  this  text 
was  spoken.  But  only  in  part,  because  no  building 
in  England,  not  even  the  Abbey  or  St.  Paul's,  can 
have  the  same  place  in  the  life  of  this  great  people 
which  the  Temple  on  Mount  Moriah  had  in  the 
Hebrew  theocracy.  Our  historic  shrines  are  noble 
and  holy — one  stately  and  beautiful,  the  other  mas- 
sive and  impressive — but,  if  Rome  is  the  eternal  city, 
Jerusalem  is  the  city  of  the  eternal,  and  its  Temple 
outtops  all  others.  In  a  unique  sense  the  temples 
where  Isaiah  prophesied  and  Jesus  taught  were  the 
centre  both  of  the  religious  faith  and  the  national  life 
of  a  race  which  had  a  genius  for  religion,  as  the 
Greeks  had  a  genius  for  art.  There  the  light  of 
God  shone  in  the  Sheklnah.  There  He  was  revealed 
in  His  unity.  His  righteousness.  His  spirituality,  His 
awful  majesty,  and  His  unutterable  love.  There  He 
told  His  will,  forgave  sins,  and  bestowed  blessing. 
From  that  central  sanctuary  His  light  and  His  truth 
went  forth,  hallowing  the  life  of  a  race  and  making 
its  daily  labour  a  ritual. 

No  wonder  there  was  bitter  grief  when  the  Temple 
was  destroyed,  and  all  but  a  ragged  remnant  of  the 
race  led  away  Into  a  alien  land  to  endure  the  lone- 
liness of  exile  and  the  indignity  of  captivity.  It  is 
true  that  God  is  equally  present  everywhere,  but 
that  does  not  mean  that  sacredness  is  spread  Indis- 
criminately over  the  earth.  Nor  can  we  find  God 
everywhere  until  we  have  first  learned  to  find  Him 
more  vividly,  more  blessedly  somewhere.  In  a  place 
made  holy  by  His  realised  presence.     Surely  there 


THE  LITTLE  SANCTUARIES  213 

is  no  spot  where  God  is  nearer  or  more  real  than  in 
a  temple  built  by  our  fathers,  hallowed  by  their 
prayers,  its  steps  worn  by  their  vanished  feet,  and 
where  we  can  pray  in  the  language  that  answers  to 
the  throb  of  our  hearts.  What  it  means  to  be  denied 
this  privilege,  to  have  the  temple  demolished  and  the 
altar  desecrated,  is  shown  us  in  the  sad  fate  of 
France  to-day,  where  our  friends  suffer  the  same 
tragedy  which  the  people  of  Israel  suffered  long  ago. 
Hence  the  deep  appeal  of  the  text,  which  is  as  true 
to-day  as  when  it  was  uttered,  in  which  God  promises 
that  about  every  forlorn  exile  a  little  sanctuary  shall 
be  built,  impalpable  and  invisible,  shielding  faith 
and  sheltering  the  holy  things  that  make  it  worth  our 
time  to  live. 

Truly  he  is  a  strange  man  who  does  not  love  the 
little  sanctuary,  the  wayside  shrine,  like  that  at  which 
the  Merciful  Knight  bowed  after  he  had  forgiven 
his  enemy.  Italy  is  rich  in  such  shrines;  and  so  is 
England,  as  we  may  learn  anew  from  a  book  entitled 
The  Priest  of  the  Ideal,  half  a  story  and  half  a  ser- 
mon, in  which  Stephen  Graham  writes  of  the  old 
holy  places  of  this  island  with  so  much  insight  and 
feeling.  Indeed,  one  chapter  of  the  story  is  actually 
a  sermon  on  the  Sanctuary,  suggested  by  the  old 
knocker  on  the  door  of  the  cathedral  at  Durham,  at 
which  the  fleeing  criminal  entered — sweat  on  the 
brow,  dust  on  the  feet,  fear  in  the  eyes — to  find 
refuge  in  days  of  old.  It  is  a  noble  sermon,  too,  as 
Is  so  often  true  in  our  fiction,  where  we  find  some  of 
the  best  preaching  of  the  day  and  some  of  the  worst. 


214  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

A  sanctuary,  he  tells  us,  may  be  the  House  of  God, 
Christ  Himself,  a  woman's  love,  the  beauty  of  na- 
ture, the  closet  of  prayer,  or  "even  a  beautiful  poem 
like  'Innisfree.'  "  It  is  any  place,  anything,  in  which 
we  find  shelter  from  the  hardness  of  the  secular  spirit 
in  the  sanctity  of  the  realised  presence  of  God.  No 
man  of  us  but  needs  the  great  cathedral,  but  we  also 
need  the  little  sanctuary,  if  only  to  bring  the  light  of 
the  altar  nearer  to  our  daily  task,  and  so  erase  the 
atheism  which  severs  life  into  the  secular  and  the 
sacred. 

Even  so  there  is  much  in  our  life  to-day  by  which 
we  may  be  led  to  understand  the  necessity  for  the 
little  sanctuary  and  its  ministry  to  man.  Every 
soul  has  Its  cathedral  hours,  its  profound  and  central 
insight,  and  it  is  the  fine  art  of  the  religious  life  to 
carry  the  light  of  those  hours  of  vision  into  the 
home,  the  shop,  the  study,  the  social  circle,  making 
these  little  sanctuaries  of  the  Most  High.  My  coun- 
trymen are  wont  to  say  that  wherever  there  is  an 
American  there  is  a  little  America,  a  tiny  bit  of  the 
homeland,  a  little  shrine  where  the  national  ideal 
lives  and  glows.  In  the  same  way,  wherever  the  lads 
of  England  go  over  the  earth,  in  whatever  "far-flung 
battle-line"  they  fight  and  fall,  there  is  a  little  Eng- 
land; and  their  graves  become  little  sanctuaries  of 
the  spirit,  the  faith,  the  civilisation  they  fought  to 
defend.  As  we  may  read  in  the  thrilling  words  of 
Rupert  Brooke,  whose  grave  is  now,  alas !  a  little 
sanctuary  in  a  far  land,  where  in  days  to  be  men  will 
bow  their  heads  in  reverence : 


THE  LITTLE  SANCTUARIES  215 

"If  I  should  die,  think  only  this  of  me: 

That  there's  some  corner  of  a  foreign  field 
That  is  for  ever  England.     There  shall  be 

In  that  rich  earth  a  richer  dust  concealed; 
A  dust  whom  England  bore,  shaped,  made  aware, 

Gave,  once,  her  flowers  to  love,  her  ways  to  roam, 
A  body  of  England's,  breathing  English  air, 

Washed  by  the  rivers,  blest  by  suns  of  home. 

And  think,  this  heart,  all  evil  shed  away, 

A  pulse  in  the  eternal  mind,  no  less 

Gives  somewhere  back  the  thoughts  by  England  given ; 

Her  sights  and  sounds;  dreams  happy  as  her  day; 

And  laughter  learnt  of  friends;  and  gentleness, 

In  hearts  at  peace,  under  an  English  heaven." 

Surely  what  is  true  of  our  patriotism  should  be 
equally  true  of  our  religion  so  that  wherever  a  Chris- 
tian goes  there  ought  to  be  a  little  sanctuary  of  the 
faith  and  spirit  of  Jesus.  Here  is  a  matter  of  vital 
importance,  into  which  we  cannot  go  in  detail  now, 
except  to  emphasise  one  or  two  aspects  of  It.  First 
of  all,  and  always,  we  must  keep  the  integrity  of  the 
mind  a  little  sanctuary  holy  and  Inviolate,  If  our 
religion  is  not  to  wither  under  the  blight  of  unreality 
and  Insincerity;  and  doubly  so  at  a  time  when  the 
Temple  of  Doctrine  Is  so  shaken,  If  not  actually  shat- 
tered. The  Impression  Is  widespread  that  the 
Church  In  general,  and  the  clergy  In  particular,  hold 
by  a  faith  officially  and  conventionally  which  Is  often 
very  unlike  what  they  really  subscribe  to  In  their  own 
minds.    That  is  to  say,  we  are  accused  of  believing 


216  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

one  thing  as  ministers  and  perhaps  something  else, 
something  less  certain  and  satisfying,  as  men.  How 
far  this  may  be  true  only  God  knows;  but  the  sus- 
picion of  it  is  doing  endless  injury  to  the  cause  of  re- 
ligion. No  man  must  lecture  another  upon  this  topic ; 
each  must  search  his  own  soul,  lest  he  fall  into  that 
hell  which  is  the  doom  of  those  who  lose  what  Dante 
calls  "the  good  of  the  mind." 

Only  those  souls  on  earth  who  struggle  to  liberate 
themselves  can  attain  this  good  of  the  mind  and 
hear  "the  voice  the  stars  had  when  they  sang  to- 
gether." If  once  they  win  it,  they  know,  as  Dante 
knew,  as  Saul  of  Tarsus  learned  when  smitten  blind 
by  the  knowledge  that  they  must  use  it  to  liberate 
others.  To  refuse  to  meet  that  responsibility  is 
"the  greatest  renunciation,"  and  if  the  most  en- 
lightened man  born  makes  that  refusal  he  is  no 
longer  enlightened.  An  example  In  point  is  Thomas 
Cranmer,  who  knew  more  than  has  ever  been 
learned  in  any  inferno — a  man  who  made  the  great 
refusal,  and  only  escaped  from  everlasting  cheap- 
ness through  a  great  expiation.  Threatened  with  the 
loss  of  dignity,  if  not  with  degradation  and 
death,  he  says  that  he  signed  with  his  own  hand 
things  "contrary  to  the  truth."  ^  But  before  he  died 
at  Oxford,  in  1556,  he  learned  how  to  make  atone- 
ment, and  as  the  flames  of  the  martyr-fire  were  ris- 
ing about  him  he  said  in  his  last  speech,  as  Strype 
reports  it:  "And  forasmuch  as  my  hand  offended  in 
writing  things  contrary  to  my  heart,  therefore  my 

*  The  Memorials  of  Thomas  Cranmer,  by  John  Strype,  1693. 


THE  LITTLE  SANCTUARIES  217 

hand  shall  be  punished."  So  saying,  he  held  his  hand 
steadily  In  the  fire,  as  no  man  could  have  done  unless 
he  had  recovered  "the  good  of  the  mind." 

Such  a  temptation  besets  all  men,  and  few  there 
be  who  do  not  In  some  degree  yield  to  It,  especially 
men  In  public  life.  The  President,  said  Emerson, 
pays  dearly  for  his  White  House,  just  because  he 
must  often  dicker  and  deal  and  compromise  to  win 
it.  No  figure  is  more  forlorn  than  the  man  who 
has  let  the  light  of  vision  fade  from  his  heart  by 
inner  apostasy  to  the  truth.  When  a  man  sells  his 
spul  for  place  or  power  or  wealth  his  genius  becomes 
mere  cunning,  and  no  moral  camouflage  can  conceal 
it.  It  is  a  peril  to  which,  In  some  way,  every  mortal 
is  exposed,  and  no  one  is  safe  unless  he  keeps  his 
heart  a  little  sanctuary  of  the  Ideals  that  make  us  men. 
Just  now,  Indeed,  we  who  fight  for  liberty  are  sorely 
tempted,  by  "sacrificing  to  the  Gods  that  smote  us," 
to  win  the  conflict  outwardly,  only  to  lose  it  Inwardly. 
If  we  lower  the  ideal,  a  war  which  began  as  a  human- 
itarian crusade  will  become  a  brutal  brawl  in  the 
dark.  Surely  that  would  be  the  saddest  of  all  de- 
feats. "Expediency  is  man's  wisdom;  doing  right 
is  God's."  Therefore  it  behoves  each  of  us  to  keep 
the  altar-fire  aglow,  renewing  our  vows  on  our  knees, 
lest  we  be  untrue  to  God  and  betray  those  who  died 
"for  the  new  order  of  the  ages."  Never  did  the  old 
wise  words  have  a  more  urgent  and  tragic  meaning, 
"Keep  thy  heart  with  all  diligence;  for  out  of  It  are 
the  issues  of  life." 

In  the  Revised  Version  the  text  has  a  slightly 


218  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

different  rendering:  "I  will  be  unto  thee  a  sanct- 
uary for  a  little";  and  it  is  full  of  sweet  and  rich 
suggestion.  Here  the  prophet  speaks  across  the  ages 
to  all  who  walk  alone  in  far  places,  all  who  are 
kept  away  from  the  sanctuary  of  common  prayer 
by  illness,  and  who  feel  so  keenly  their  deprivation. 
God  Himself  becomes  their  sanctuary,  and  what 
they  lose  of  the  fellowship  of  social  prayer  is  made 
up  to  them  by  the  joy  of  His  communion.  Also, 
when  we  leave  the  dear  sanctuary  of  our  youth,  to 
which  we  are  bound  by  so  many  ties  of  love,  memory, 
and  tradition,  and  go  to  a  new  home  or  a  strange 
land,  this  text  speaks  with  appealing  tenderness  and 
comfort.  It  tells  us  of  One  who  can  go  with  those 
who  go  and  stay  with  those  who  stay,  and  be  every- 
where blessed;  One  in  whose  love  there  is  no  distance 
and  no  darkness.  In  the  same  ineffable  way,  when 
those  whom  we  love  vanish  from  us  "for  a  little," 
and  our  days  and  nights  become  a  litany  of  desola- 
tion, God  makes  a  little  sanctuary  round  about  us, 
coming  softly  into  the  stillness  which  death  makes 
when  it  passes  by.  He  it  is  who  renews  that  heroic 
and  holy  hope  that  when  the  night  is  gone  and  the 
morning  faces  smile,  we  shall  meet  those  whom  we 
"have  loved  long  since  and  lost  awhile." 

There  is  yet  a  further  hint  which  we  may  wisely 
lay  to  heart  in  this  day  of  upheaval,  when  the  forms 
of  faith,  both  social  and  religious,  seem  to  be  falling 
to  pieces,  leaving  us  shelterless.  Even  the  wisest 
man  cannot  tell  what  the  hidden  future  may  hold, 
but  all  of  us  have  the  feeling  that  It  will  be  some- 


THE  LITTLE  SANCTUARIES  219 

thing  very  different  from  the  past.  It  may  be  that 
as  the  people  of  old  attained  to  a  more  spiritual 
religion  after  the  Temple  was  destroyed  and  its 
ritual  withdrawn,  so  we  of  to-day,  by  the  very  shat- 
tering of  our  forms  of  faith,  may  win  a  higher, 
deeper,  more  divinely  real  experience  of  things  im- 
mortal. Indeed,  it  will  be  so  to  our  salvation,  if  each 
of  us  keeps  his  own  heart  a  little  sanctuary  of  the 
faith  and  spirit  of  Jesus,  waiting  for  the  coming  of 
the  Spirit  who  shall  endue  us  with  light  and  power; 
as  did  that  soldier  who  sees  with  clearer  light  enow, 
and  who  left  these  haunting  lines : 

"I  have  a  temple  I  do  not 
Visit,  a  heart  I  have  forgot, 
A  self  that  I  have  never  met, 
A  secret  .shrine — and  yet,  and  yet. 

This  sanctuary  of  my  soul 
Unwitting  I  keep  white  and  whole, 
Unlatched  and  lit,  if  Thou  should  care 
To  enter  or  to  tarry  there. 

With  parted  lips  and  outstretched  hands 
And  listening  ears  Thy  servant  stands; 
Call  Thou  early,  call  Thou  late, 
To  Thy  great  service  dedicate."  ^ 

At  last,  when  our  poor  body,  which  is  a  temple 
of  the  Holy  Spirit,  is  dissolved  in  the  mysterious 
chemistry  of  death,  and  we  must  leave  this  earthly 

^  Expectans  Expectavi,   by   Charles   Sorley. 


220  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

life  "for  a  little,"  we  have  assurance  doubly  sure  in 
Him  whom  we  follow  that  God  the  Father,  out  of 
whose  love  and  wisdom  we  were  born,  will  be  our 
sanctuary  from  the  vanishings  of  Time — God  the 
home  of  the  soul  here  and  hereafter,  "from  always 
to  for  ever." 


THE  VICTORY  OF  THE  CROSS » 

"Father,  into  Thy  hands  I  comnoiend  My  spirit." — 
Luke  xxiii.  46. 

ON  this  day,  and  In  a  world  at  war,  the  Cross  of 
Christ  is  a  reality;  it  is  the  heart  of  the  world 
laid  bare.  It  is  no  isolated  fact  in  history,  much  less 
a  remote  horror  set  on  a  far  sky-line,  but  a  shadow 
near  to  each  of  us,  vivid  in  its  urgency,  heavy  in  its 
pressure  upon  us.  To-day  we  do  not  think  of  Jesus 
as  a  lonely  Sufferer,  for  it  seems  to  us,  somehow, 
that  we  were  with  Him  there  on  that  dark  Cross 
outside  the  city -gate,  and  that  He  is  with  us  here. 
Time  and  distance  vanish,  and  we  are  lifted  unto 
a  vision  of  an  eternal  sacrifice,  we  sharers  of  His 
victory  then,  He  a  partaker  of  our  struggle  now. 
Such  is  our  solidarity  of  suffering,  and  the  heavy 
weight  upon  our  hearts,  that  we  have  a  dim,  faint 
sense,  to  the  measure  of  our  power,  of  the  burden 
he  bore. 

Four  years  of  blood  and  agony  have  given  us  a 
deeper,  clearer  insight,  purifying  our  eyes  of  dust 
by  a  flood  of  bitter  tears.  To-day  we  read  the  stately 
stanzas  of  the  53rd  Chapter  of  Isaiah  with  a  new 
vision,  a  new  wonder;  and  the  Figure  that  moves 
through  those  lines — gentle,  heroic,  silent,  haunting, 

*Good  Friday,    1918. 
221 


222  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

despised  and  rejected  of  men,  smitten  of  God  and 
afflicted — seems  a  living  Presence  by  our  side,  looking 
at  us  with  all-pitying  eyes,  touching  us  with  hands 
of  healing.  Truly  He  is  the  Suffering  Servant  of 
God,  revealing  the  redeeming  truth  that,  as  there  is 
a  law  of  the  survival  of  the  fittest,  so  there  is  a  law 
of  the  sacrifice  of  the  best. 

To-day  is  this  truth  fulfilled  before  our  eyes,  and 
we  realise  as  never  before  that  not  only  the  death 
of  Jesus,  but  His  life,  was  one  long  atonement,  just 
because  His  love  made  Him  one  with  humanity  in 
its  sin,  its  woe,  and  its  destiny.  Therefore,  a  cup 
of  cold  water  given  to  a  fellow  man  helps  Him, 
and  an  injury  to  one  of  these  little  ones  hurts  Him ! 
Surely  He  is  "the  Lamb  slain  from  the  foundation 
of  the  world,"  and,  in  His  dying,  death  is  van- 
quished: 

"And  all  through  life  I  see  a  Cross 

Where  sons  of  men  yield  up  their  breath. 
There  is  no  gain  except  by  loss, 
There  is  no  life  except  by  death." 

What  a  scene  was  that  in  which  the  words  of  the 
text  had  their  setting,  as  the  ordeal  of  agony  ended, 
and  the  evening  closed  in.  Never  did  the  dying  sun 
look  down  upon  a  scene  more  ghastly,  not  alone  in 
its  physical  horror,  but  in  its  moral  atrocity.  Kind- 
ness crucified  by  cruelty.  Love  put  to  death  by  brutal- 
ity. Justice  defamed  by  cunning,  malignant  bigotry — 
tragedy  can  go  no  further !  Outwardly  the  Cross  was 
an  utter  defeat;  inwardly  it  was  the  ultimate  victory. 


THE  VICTORY  OF  THE  CROSS         223 

Whether  these  last  words  were  a  parting  wrench  of 
pain,  a  prayer  of  relief  at  the  mercy  of  death,  or  a 
cry  of  joy  that  He  had  endured  to  the  end,  we  know 
not.  Perhaps  they  were  all  these  in  one,  telling  us 
that  He  had  triumphed,  not  only  over  physical  tor- 
ture and  moral  outrage,  but  over  those  dark  foes  we 
know  not  nor  can  name  which  assail  the  soul  in  its 
extremity : 

"Friend,  it  is  over  now, 
The  passion,  the  sweat,  the  pains, 
Only  the  truth  remains."  ^ 

As  men  live  so  they  die,  death  being  an  apoca- 
lypse of  life,  revealing  its  faith,  its  passion,  and  its 
ruling  vision.  If  one  has  lived  the  sceptical  life, 
critical,  questioning,  doubting,  he  will  say  with 
Hobbes:  "I  am  'going  to  take  a  leap  in  the  dark; 
I  commit  my  body  to  the  worms  and  my  spirit  to  the 
great  Perhaps."  If  he  has  been  a  seeker  after  light, 
searching  for  it  in  high  places  and  low,  in  far  places 
and  near  by,  he  will  say  with  Goethe,  "More  light, 
more  light!"  If  he  has  lived  as  Wesley  lived,  dedi- 
cated to  God  and  His  service,  and  to  man  and  his 
redemption,  he  will  come  to  his  end  with  the  assur- 
ance :  "The  best  of  all  is,  God  is  with  us."  If  he  has 
lived  the  life  of  a  jester,  as  Rabelais  did,  he  will 
say:  "Let  down  the  curtain;  the  farce  is  played  out." 
What  determines  the  course  of  the  life  of  a  man 
decides  his  attitude  in  death;  and  so  it  was  with  the 

'  Good  Friday,  by  John  Masefield. 


224  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

Great  Life.  The  last  words  of  Jesus  were  a  quota- 
tion from  the  Psalms,  the  book  of  the  poetry  and 
piety  of  the  people  of  His  fathers,  in  which  so  many 
had  found  succour  before  Him  and  so  many  have 
found  solace  since. 

What  tender,  trustful,  triumphant  words  they 
were,  breathing  a  prayer  of  peace  after  the  storm: 
*'Into  Thy  hands  I  commit  my  spirit."  Some  one 
has  pointed  out  that  this  was  the  bedside  prayer 
which  every  Hebrew  mother  taught  her  child  as 
the  evening  shadows  fell — like  the  little  prayers  we 
learned  long  ago,  and  have  taught  to  our  children; 
and  so  the  first  faith  of  Jesus  was  the  last,  as  be- 
fitted One  to  whom  the  child-heart  was  the  finest 
flower  and  essence  of  religion.  Nothing  is  easier 
than  to  keep  our  first  faith  when  the  sky  is  sunny 
overhead  and  the  path  smooth  before  us.  But  when 
shadows  fall,  and  storms  beat  upon  us,  it  is  different. 
The  ministry  of  Jesus  in  Galilee  was  like  a  summer; 
but  in  Judea  He  met  icy  hostility,  cold  Indifference, 
trickery  among  His  enemies  and  treachery  among 
His  friends,  "and  it  was  winter."  Yet  through  all 
trial,  all  temptation,  all  tragedy,  up  to  the  last  bitter 
hour,  He  kept  the  highest  and  sweetest  faith.  Thus 
the  evensong  which  His  mother  had  taught  Him  long 
ago  lingered  last  upon  His  lips,  as  He  entered  "the 
kep,  vast,  speechlessness  of  death." 

Only,  to  this  simple  prayer — which  to  the  Psalm- 
ist was  a  prjiyer  not  for  death,  but  for  life  and  its 
peril — Jesus  added  the  one  great,  deep,  tender  word 
which  summed  up  His  life.  His  faith,  His  vision; 


THE  VICTORY  OF  THE  CROSS         225 

Father!  Never  has  any  word  fallen  from  mortal 
lips  having  such  meaning  as  the  word  Father  on  the 
lips  of  Jesus  in  the  black  agony  of  His  death,  amid 
the  railing,  revilings,  and  mocking  of  His  enemies! 
God  eternal,  God  paternal — in  that  faith  Jesus  lived, 
in  that  faith  He  died,  testing  it  to  the  uttermost. 
Father!  That  was  His  own  word,  His  key  to  life, 
His  first  truth  and  His  last;  it  was  His  religion.  In 
youth  He  was  eager  to  be  about  His  "Father's  busi- 
ness," and  He  filled  His  swift  and  gentle  years  with 
that  labour,  ere  the  night  cometh  when  no  man  can 
work.  He  lived  to  do  the  will  of  His  Father.  It 
was  His  meat,  His  milk.  His  labour.  His  rest,  His 
exceeding  great  joy."  Other  work,  other  wish,  He 
had  none,  and  in  that  wise  and  holy  Will  He  found 
a  peace  which  the  world  can  neither  give  nor  take 
away.  Father!  not  Fate,  not  force;  that  was  the 
word  He  taught  us  in  the  brief,  universal  prayer — 
and  if  you  go  to  the  traditional  site  of  that  prayer 
you  will  find  a  tiny  marble  chapel,  and  on  its  walls 
in  all  the  languages  that  have  learned  its  wisdom, 
the  words:  "Our  Father."  God  all-powerful,  God 
all-loving,  by  that  faith  Jesus  was  strengthened  in 
life  and  sustained  in  death.  While  the  Father  was 
with  Him  all  was  well.  When  for  one  brief,  bitter 
moment  He  felt  Himself  forsaken  of  His  father,  the 
world  turned  black.  But  it  was  only  for  a  moment; 
the  shadow  passed,  and  the  God  whom  He  had 
served  in  life  became  His  solace  in  death.  It  is  the 
glory  of  our  Leader  that  He  faced  the  blackest  mys- 
tery in  this  dark  world  and  found  the  brightest  faith. 


226  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

bringing  life  and  immortality  to  light  by  His  faith- 
fulness in  life,  His  fortitude  in  death,  and  His  faith 
in  God  the  Father.  If  by  His  grace  we  would  win  a 
like  victory  on  our  little  cross,  it  must  be  by  trusting 
the  Father  whom  He  trusted  unto  the  uttermost, 
and  by  resting  in  the  love  in  which  He  rested. 

What  Jesus  saw  behind  the  heavy  drapery  of 
death  He  did  not  tell  us,  except  that  the  Father 
is  there.  For  Him  that  was  enough.  The  vast  and 
tender  Power  which  cared  for  Him  here  He  trusted 
hereafter  and  for  ever.  He  was  utterly  confident, 
but  in  nowise  curious,  willing  to  wait  the  will  of  the 
Father  into  whose  soft,  fascinating  shadow  He  went 
without  fear.  Here  is  a  vision  of  death  ;:l;::t  if  'tself 
victory,  for  that  it  disentangles  it  from  dread,  dis- 
infects it  of  terror,  and  makes  it  holy  and  beautiful. 
"Into  Thy  hands" — that  is  the  Highest  faith,  as  it 
is  the  truest  wisdom;  and  we  need  not  fear  to  fall 
into  those  Father-hands  whose  fingers  formed  our 
very  being,  even  as  they  piled  up  the  mountains  and 
set  the  stars  in  their  orbits.  No,  we  do  jiot  sink  into 
disease,  decay,  and  destruction,  but  into  ^he  hands  of 
Him  who  made  us  for  Himself,  and  He  will  keep 
that  which  we  commit  to  His  care.  By  the  same  token, 
let  us  trust  into  those  hands  the  keeping  of  our  dear, 
pitiful,  august  dead,  of  whom  we  think  so  often  and 
with  such  unutterable  longing.  They  are  His.  He 
made  them.  He  loves  them,  and  He  will  do  for  them 
more  than  we  can  ask  or  think  or  dream. 

Ever  more  it  is  "dust  unto  dust,  and  the  spirit 
unto  God  who  gave  it,"  saith  the  Preacher  of  Des- 


THE  VICTORY  OF  THE  CROSS  227 

pair.  But  Jesus  did  not  think  of  His  body,  nor  did 
He  fear  them  that  kill  the  body;  He  thought  only 
of  His  spirit,  in  prayer  commending  it  to  the  Father 
of  Spirit.  "My  spirit" — how  lovely,  how  heroic, 
how  lofty  and  pure  it  was,  all-forgiving  and  all-en- 
during, the  glory  and  sanctity  of  the  world !  What 
is  spirit  if  it  be  not  light  and  flame  and  beauty? 
More  subtle  than  ether,  more  swift  than  thought,  it 
is  life  at  its  highest,  its  finest,  its  holiest — that  within 
us  akin  to  God.  It  is  the  delicate  and  elusive  essence 
of  being,  its  bloom,  its  grace,  its  glory,  that  in  us  of 
the  true  and  everlasting;  that  which  touches  dull 
matter  and  transfigures  it  into  shapes  lovely  and 
haunting.  God  is  spirit !  Even  so,  dying,  Jesus  sur- 
rendered His  spirit  to  the  Universal  Spirit,  as  a 
spark  ascending  seeks  the  sun,  giving  back  in  a  last 
renunciation  the  precious  thing  God  had  given  to 
Him. 

Such  was  the  victory  of  the  Cross,  and  as  we  watch 
we  do  not  ask  for  a  justification  for  things  happening 
so.  Instead,  somehow,  in  a  way  beyond  words,  we 
are  not  only  subdued,  but  exalted  and  purified  by 
it.  For  we  are  left  with  the  impression  that  the 
heroic  Victim,  though  in  one  sense  and  outwardly 
He  failed,  was  yet  in  another  and  truer  sense  su- 
perior to  the  world  in  which  He  appeared;  was  in 
some  way,  which  we  do  not  seek  to  define,  untouched 
by  the  tragedy,  and  was  rather  set  free  from  life 
than  deprived  of  it.  Now  this  impression,  this  in- 
sight, really  implies  that  the  world  of  tragedy,  of 


228  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

sorrow,  of  sin  is  no  final  reality,  but  only  a  part  of 
reality  taken  for  a  whole,  and,  when  so  taken,  untrue. 
It  means  that  if  we  could  see  the  whole,  and  the 
tragic  facts  in  their  place  in  it,  we  should  find  them, 
not  abolished,  indeed,  but  transmuted,  transfigured, 
explained,  justified — find,  that  is,  that  suffering  and 
death  count  for  little,  and  greatness  of  soul  for 
everything.  Here,  of  a  truth,  is  the  faith  that  looks 
through  the  shadow  of  death  and  sees  into  the  life 
of  things. 

All  high  wisdom,  all  heroic  faith  comes  at  last 
to  this :  victory  over  life,  over  death,  over  self,  over 
sin  is  won  by  surrender  to  the  loving  will  of  Him 
whose  we  are  and  who  made  us  for  Himself.  The 
dying  prayer  of  Jesus  only  breathed  out  the  spirit, 
the  habit,  the  joy  of  His  life.  What  He  did  on  the 
Cross  He  had  been  doing  all  His  days,  offering  Him- 
self to  His  Father  to  serve  or  to  suffer,  to  do  or  to 
bear;  and  in  death  He  made  a  last  offering.  It  Is 
this  that  makes  the  Cross  not  simply  a  martyrdom, 
but  a  revelation  of  a  Wisdom  deeper  than  we  can 
imagine,  and  of  a  love  that  is  the  keeper  of  unknown 
redemptions.  Nor  should  we  ever  have  known  this 
truth  in  its  height  and  depth  and  wonder  but  for 
"that  strange  Man  on  the  Cross"  outside  the  city 
gate,  who  by  His  surrender  became  our  Saviour  and 
by  His  suffering  became  our  Healer.  Even  now  we 
cannot  truly  know  it  until  we  take  up  our  cross  and 
follow  Him,  living  the  surrendered  life,  giving  our 
utmost  to  the  highest. 


THE  VICTORY  OF  THE  CROSS         229 

"O  Cross  that  liftest  up  my  head, 

I  dare  not  ask  to  fly  from  thee, 
I  lay  in  dust,  life's  glory  dead. 
And  from  the  ground  there  blossoms  red 

Life  that  shall  endless  be." 


THE  ETERNAL  VALUES 

"Why  seek  ye  the  living  among  the  dead  ?    He  is  not  here ; 
He  is  risen." — Luke  xxiv.  5,  6. 

NO  hour  on  earth  is  more  bleak,  more  bitter, 
than  when  we  go  back  from  a  new  grave  in 
which  we  have  buried  the  fellowship  of  years.  It 
did  not  need  Lowell  to  tell  us  what  it  means  in  those 
poignant  lines,  "After  the  Burial."  When  the  tie 
has  been  broken,  and  before  we  have  had  time  to 
re-knit  our  faith,  there  falls  upon  us  an  utter  and 
unutterable  desolation.  Death  seems  to  divide  Di- 
vinity with  God.  Such  was  the  shadow  which 
haunted  that  little  band  when  they  returned  early 
in  the  morning  to  the  tomb  of  Jesus,  bringing  spices 
to  care  for  His  body.  Hope  was  dead,  only  love 
remained,  and  it  clung  to  a  Form  familiar  and  holy 
which  they  had  seen  mutilated  in  death. 

They  found  an  empty  tomb  and  shining  figures 
sitting  where  the  body  of  Jesus  had  lain.  As  Augus- 
tine said,  that  which  was  the  place  for  worms  had 
become  a  place  for  angels.  But  their  report  was 
held  to  be  an  idle  tale.  Let  us  not  forget  that  the 
disciples  were  the  first  doubters  of  the  Easter  story, 
and  had  to  be  won  to  faith.  If  you  were  told  that 
one  whom  you  had  laid  in  the  grave  had  been  seen 
alive  again,  what  would  you  do?     Whatever  wild 

230 


THE  ETERNAL  VALUES  231 

wish  might  leap  in  your  heart,  not  one  of  you  but 
would  first  make  sure  that  it  was  true.  The  dis- 
ciples of  Jesus  were  men  and  women  with  minds  like 
our  own.  No  more  than  we  did  they  wish  to  mistake 
fancy  for  fact,  shadow  for  substance.  Surely  only  a 
fact  could  have  won  the  faith  of  those  who  looked 
upon  the  ghastly  scene  of  the  Cross.  As  to  the  de- 
tails of  the  Easter  fact,  that  is  a  matter  of  testimony 
and  record,  but  the  fact  itself  has  furnished  its  own 
proof  age-long  and  triumphant. 

Before  we  proceed  further,  let  us  ask  what  was 
the  nature  of  the  Easter  fact  which  turned  sorrow 
into  song  and  changed  a  band  of  dejected  disciples 
into  flaming  heralds  of  a  new,  victorious  hope? 
Surely  the  life  of  Jesus,  and  still  more  His  death 
and  resurrection,  is  the  supreme  demonstration,  to 
which  there  is  n'o  parallel,  of  the  power  of  spirit; 
of  that  for  which  science  has  no  term,  and  the  secret 
of  which  it  cannot  know.  Here  is  a  fact,  a  force, 
an  influence  in  perfect  harmony  with  physical  forces, 
but  not  of  them,  and  only  faintly  do  they  symbolise 
it.  True,  we  have  tokens  of  the  power  of  spirit 
everywhere,  but  the  profound  and  special  meaning 
of  the  life  of  Jesus  is  its  revelation  of  spiritual  power 
acting  directly,  not  only  upon  inanimate  matter,  but 
upon  man  himself,  effecting  vital  changes  in  his  faith, 
his  thought,  his  character,  and  even  in  his  physical 
life.  In  the  history  of  that  Life  it  is  seen  restoring 
discordant  minds  to  harmony,  withered  bodies  to 
soundness,  the  sick  to  health,  the  blind  to  §ight,  and 
the  recently  dead  to  life. 


232  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

Once  we  see  that  Jesus  was  the  greatest,  the  most 
original,  the  most  creative,  the  most  dynamic  of 
spiritual  personalities,  the  facts  recorded  of  Him 
are  not  only  intelligible,  but  luminous.  What  men 
call  miracles  are  but  the  graceful  gestures  of  such 
a  Being,  bearing  witness  to  the  divinity  of  Spirit  as 
creator,  repairer,  and  master  of  matter.  In  such  a 
history  the  story  of  the  Resurrection  may  seem  won- 
derful— as,  indeed,  it  is — but,  none  the  less,  as  nat- 
ural as  the  blooming  of  a  flower  or  the  shining  of  a 
star,  since  even  outside  that  history  we  can  see  no 
limit  to  the  power  of  spirit.  Jesus  did  not  create 
faith  in  immortality:  the  path  of  early  history  is 
marked  by  the  monuments  of  forgotten  peoples,  who 
left  nothing  but  proofs  of  their  faith  in  a  future  life. 
Jesus  revealed  Eternal  Life.  What  was  before  a 
guess,  or  at  best  a  hope.  He  revealed  to  be  a  fact 
by  the  power  of  spirit,  a  power  that  gives  immortal- 
ity its  true  character  and  shows  it  to  be  an  ever 
more  and  more  abundant  life.  Once  for  all,  vic- 
toriously, by  the  power  of  an  endless  life,  He  re- 
vealed 

That  life  is  ever  lord  of  death, 
And  love  can  never  lose  its  own. 

But  there  is  another  question  with  which  we  must 
deal,  if  we  would  know  the  basis  of  belief  in  a  future 
life.  Admit  that  it  is  an  instinct,  an  intuition,  an  in- 
spiration, alive  from  the  earliest  time  and  active  in 
every  land,  what  is  its  basis?  At  bottom  it  is  a  ques- 
tion of  eternal  values.     If  life  is  worthless,  so  is  im- 


THE  ETERNAL  VALUES  233 

mortality.  If  life  has  any  excuse  for  being,  if  it  has 
meaning,  worth,  value,  actual  or  prophetic,  it  is  a 
question  of  conserving  those  values.  Here  is  the 
root  of  faith  in  the  future  life.  Our  healthy  sense 
of  the  worth  of  life,  and  our  instinctive  clinging  to 
it  despite  its  sorrows,  is  the  first  intimation  of  that 
faith.  All  that  man  has  achieved  of  intellectual 
power,  moral  worth  and  spiritual  beauty  is  a  justi- 
fication of  that  faith.  By  the  same  token,  the  ex- 
perience which  realises  those  values  confirms  that 
faith  and  makes  it  victorious.  Such  is  my  thesis  to- 
day, and  it  brings  the  whole  question  very  close  to 
each  of  us  in  a  practical  way. 

Faith  is  the  affirmation  that  life  has  value.  It 
is  not  sight,  but  insight.  It  makes  the  venture  and 
affirms  that  life  is  real,  sane,  worth  while,  and  that 
things  are  not  what  they  seem.  It  is  "anticipated 
attainment."  That  is  to  say,  it  asserts  that  life  has 
eternal  meanings,  and  lives  as  if  those  meanings 
were  present  realities.  As  Coleridge  said,  it  bids 
eternal  truth  be  present  fact.  That  which  to  knowl- 
edge is  but  a  Word  to  Faith  has  become  Flesh. 
Knowledge  is  patient;  faith  is  prophetic.  If  knowl- 
edge is  slow,  the  feet  of  faith  are  swift.  It  runs  for- 
ward into  the  future,  takes  possession  of  ideals,  and 
makes  them  immediate  and  commanding.  It  is  the 
substance  of  things  hoped  for,  the  evidence  of  things 
lot  seen,  and  the  power  that  makes  dreams  come  true. 
Human  brotherhood  is  a  noble  dream — but  men 
have  to  be  made  brothers,  and  how  long  it  takes 


234  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

history  tells.  But  to  faith  they  are  brothers  now, 
drawn  together  into  the  unity  and  fellowship  of  a 
common  worship.  Knowledge  follows  after  faith, 
slowly  fulfilling  its  prophecies  of  things  to  be.  What 
a  picture  science  paints! 

Whirling  fire-mist  cools  and  condenses  into  the 
earth;  life  appears,  swimming  in  fish,  growing  in 
plants,  and  at  last  walking  erect  in  man.  Mind  and 
character  appear  in  thinkers,  saints,  seers.  Moses 
prefers  service  to  ease,  Socrates  chooses  the  high 
paths  of  truth  and  justice,  David  sings  songs  that 
haunt  us  still,  Jesus  dies  for  humanity.  On  a  thou- 
sand altars  humanity  offers  the  final  sacrifice  for  the 
sake  of  truth,  liberty,  righteousness.  Through  what 
travail,  age-long  and  full  of  agony,  nature  toiled  and 
aspired  to  these  flowers  of  moral  worth  and  beauty. 
By  what  vast  struggles,  sublime  in  their  sacrificial 
heroism,  has  the  moral  life  been  achieved  and  pre- 
served. Has  it  value,  or  is  nature  only  blowing 
bubbles?  Is  it  worth  the  cost,  or  did  the  Eternal 
when  He  took  dust  and  made  man  simply  play  with 
it?  Finally,  the  earth  cools,  its  heat  and  light  gone, 
and  darkness  falls  again.  Is  all  moral  value  erased 
as  the  last  man  dies  in  a  world  of  graves,  forgotten 
as  a  thing  futile  and  foolish?    Faith  says  no! 

All  human  values  were  heightened  by  the  life  of 
Jesus.  He  brought  life,  as  well  as  immortality,  to 
light,  bringing  out  its  colour  and  its  splendour.  No 
fact,  no  fellowship  but  was  touched  by  Him  to  finer 
issues.  The  home,  the  family,  the  life  of  woman 
and  child,  of  slave  and  saint  were  exalted  and  glori- 


THE  ETERNAL  VALUES  235 

fied  by  His  gospel.  In  Greek  drama  a  child  was 
only  a  piece  of  stage  setting.  Humanity  crucified 
Him  on  a  Cross,  but  even  the  Cross  became  a  symbol 
of  sanctity.  The  hard  old  world  was  made  larger, 
sweeter,  richer,  for  ever  because  His  great  soul 
passed  through  it.  The  old,  high  instincts  of  the 
soul  of  man,  burning  dimly  in  the  dark,  became 
beacons  of  hope  and  expectation.  Even  a  wayside 
flower  is  a  teacher  of  wise  and  good  and  beautiful 
truth,  since  Jesus  lived.  More  than  an  inspiration, 
He  was  a  revelation :  He  made  all  good  things  bet- 
ter, all  evil  things  more  ugly,  every  sanctity  more 
sacred,  and  every  hope  more  radiant.  His  death 
evoked  light  from  darkness,  sweetness  from  bitter- 
ness— like  an  alabaster  box  of  precious  ointment 
broken  to  anoint  a  hard,  ungrateful  world.  Jesus  did 
not  argue  for  immortality,  He  unveiled  the  value  of 
life.  By  His  faithfulness  He  confirmed  the  faith 
of  humanity. 

Rehgion  is  the  realisation  of  the  value  of  life. 
And  this  is  especially  true  of  the  religion  of  Jesus, 
albeit  He  never  used  the  word  Religion,  so  far  as 
we  have  record,  but  always  the  word  Life  instead 
— as  if  to  say  that  religion  and  life  are  one  or  neither 
is  of  any  worth.  His  gospel  is  a  disclosure  of  the 
deepest  reality  of  God  through  the  highest  nature 
of  man.  In  Him  our  humanity  found  its  Revealer, 
its  Vindicator,  its  incomparable  Teacher  and  Re- 
deemer. Celsus,  an  early  enemy  of  His  faith,  said 
truly  that  "The  root  of  Christianity  is  its  excessive 
valuation  of  the  human  soul,  and  the  absurd  idea 


236  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

that  God  takes  an  interest  in  man."  Exactly;  as 
Emerson  said,  "Jesus  alone  in  history  estimated  the 
greatness  of  man,"  his  divine  origin  and  destiny, 
and  the  vast  possibilities  of  his  nature.  In  the  Gospel 
of  Jesus  men  are  sons  of  God  here,  now,  always, 
and,  if  sons,  heirs  of  all  that  is  and  is  to  be.  Often 
men  are  wayward  sons,  sometimes  wicked  sons.  Yet 
they  are  sons  of  God  nevertheless,  and  to  realise  that 
fact  and  live  accordingly  is  religion. 

Jesus  came,  He  said,  that  men  might  have  life, 
and  have  it  abundantly — life  rich,  radiant,  over- 
flowing, triumphant.  Manifestly,  if  we  are  immortal 
at  all  we  are  immortal  here  and  now.  Knowledge 
of  that  truth,  not  as  a  theory  but  as  a  reality,  sets 
us  free  from  fear  of  death  and  the  tyranny  of  time. 
It  is  to  realise  the  Eternal  life.  Not  mere  duration, 
but  a  sense  of  the  depth  of  life,  its  worth,  its  beauty, 
its  splendour.  What  Jesus  calls  Eternal  Life,  is  life 
in  which  man  overcomes  death  by  discovering  his 
citizenship  in  the  Divine  society.  He  asks  man  to 
take  his  stand  among  the  eternal  things,  and  thus 
commit  himself  to  aims  and  enterprises  which  exceed 
the  short  span  of  mortal  days.  The  immortality  in 
which  he  believes  will  thus  become  a  reality.  Life 
so  lived  will  reveal  its  own  eternal  quality  and  proph- 
ecy. Faith  is  fidelity  to  our  finest  instincts;  the 
fellowship  of  the  eternal  life  is  its  fruition.  As  St. 
Augustine  put  it,  summing  up  the  truth  in  one  flash- 
ing line :  "Join  thyself  to  the  Eternal  God,  and  thou 
shalt  be  eternal." 

Since  this  is  so,  surely  the  whole  question  of  im- 


THE  ETERNAL  VALUES  237 

mortality  is  a  question  of  the  conservation  of  the 
values  of  life.  First  Affirmation,  then  Realisation, 
and  finally  a  treasuring  up  of  the  ineffable  wealth 
of  moral  and  spiritual  worth.  What  are  the  su- 
preme values  of  life?  Not  in  what  we  possess,  not 
what  we  know,  not  even  what  we  do,  but  what  we 
are.  They  are  personal  qualities.  The  noblest  thing 
earth  has  to  show  the  stars  is  a  pure,  refined,  valiant 
personality.  The  ideal  and  goal  of  the  universe, 
so  far  as  we  can  know  its  purpose,  is  the  growth  of 
heroic  human  souls.  St.  Paul  saw  in  the  groans  and 
travail  cries  of  nature  the  birth-throes  of  the  sons  of 
God,  and  his  vision  is  verified  by  the  science  of  to- 
day. What  is  evolution  but  a  tracing  of  the  age- 
long story  of  the  struggle  of  nature  upward  out  of 
mud  to  mind,  out  of  matter  to  spirit.  Out  of  savag- 
ery to  saintliness?  They  ask  too  much  who  ask  us  to 
think  that  these  treasures,  so  high  and  hard-won,  are 
cast  at  last  as  rubbish  to  the  void.  How  then  are 
they  preserved  in  face  of  death? 

There  are  those  who  say  that  personal  immor- 
tality is  not  needed  to  conserve  the  values  of  life. 
Only  God  is  eternal,  and  such  values  as  our  little 
lives  have,  return  to  Him,  absorbed  in  His  life,  as 
a  candle  fades  into  the  sunlight,  as  a  dew-drop  slips 
into  the  sea.  No  moral  worth  is  ever  lost.  Such  an 
idea  seems  very  lofty  and  profound,  but  the  poet 
who  wrote  the  lines : 

The  forces  that  were  Christ 
Have  taken  new  forms  and  fled, 


238  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

wrote  words  without  meaning.  It  is  impossible  for 
two  reasons.  First,  they  are  personal  forces,  and 
if  personality  ends  in  death  they  end  too.  The 
notion  of  love  as  a  quality  of  God,  of  which  Jesus 
was  a  fleeting  form,  and  the  value  of  which  He, 
dying  on  the  Cross,  surrendered,  is  absurd.  Second, 
such  qualities  are  not  entities  to  be  abstracted  from 
persons  and  absorbed  by  another.  They  cannot  be 
transferred.  The  goodness  of  Jesus  was  His  own, 
woven  with  the  fibre  of  His  being,  and  can  never  be 
taken  from  Him.  Moreover,  it  makes  God  a  moral 
monstrosity,  an  infinite  vampire,  crushing  the  souls 
of  men  for  their  sweetness  and  casting  them  away. 
Besides,  love,  justice,  mercy  are  social  qualities  and 
exist  only  in  social  fellowship.  If  they  melt  into 
God  we  have  at  last  a  vision  of  a  God  just,  but  just 
to  no  one,  loving  no  one  but  Himself,  His  throne  a 
universal  cemetery! 

No,  if  the  bells  are  tolling  a  march  to  everlasting 
death  in  which  Jesus  and  Judas  sleep  together,  all 
moral  value  erased  in  dust,  let  us  face  the  fact,  and 
not  attempt  to  muffle  their  tones  with  seductive 
phrases.  Stately,  grave  and  noble  were  the  lines  of 
George  Eliot,  who,  when  she  lost  faith  in  personal 
immortality,  prayed  that  she  might  join  the  Choir 
Invisible 

Of  those  immortal  dead  who  live  again, 
In  minds  made  better  by  their  presence, 

but  they  tell  us  very  little.  Our  influence  and  ex- 
ample may  impress  our  fellows  for  good  or  ill,  be- 


THE  ETERNAL  VALUES  239 

coming  a  part  of  the  body  of  law  by  which  the  race 
is  ruled.  But  what  is  the  nature  of  that  influence? 
It  is  not  that  our  spirit  passes  into  them,  but  that 
it  evokes  in  them  like  qualities  of  their  own.  What 
though  Sappho  sing  divinely  and  her  song  go 
sobbing  down  the  years,  if  she  be  choked  in  dust? 
Wherefore  the  lives  of  saints  and  martyrs,  if  it  be 
only  that  in  a  dim  far  time  a  few  men  shall  be  utterly 
good  and  wise?  Then  what?  At  last  the  earth 
will  grow  cold,  the  race  will  vanish,  and  the  Choir 
Invisible  will  no  longer  be  the  gladness  of  the  world! 
Death  will  reign  and  every  moral  value  vanish  I 

What  of  it?  some  one  will  ask,  seeking  a  last 
refuge  from  "the  malice  of  obliterated  life."  Is  not 
virtue  its  own  reward,  its  own  sweetness  and  satis- 
faction? Is  not  morality  worth  while,  even  if  pity 
be  the  root  of  it?  Assuredly;  but  what  is  the  reward 
of  virtue  if  it  be  not  the  glory  and  the  opportunity 
of  more  virtue,  the  glory,  as  Tennyson  sang,  of  going 
on  and  still  to  be,  that  we  may  be  better.  Else  it 
were  better  if  the  earth  had  remained  like  the  moon, 
"a  mass  of  slag,  idle  and  without  a  tenant."  No, 
no;  think  it  all  through  and  you  will  see  that  per- 
sonal immortality  is  the  only  imaginable  way  of  con- 
serving the  precious  values  of  love,  mercy,  justice, 
character — values  which  the  universe  toiled  through 
long  eras  to  achieve,  and  which  humanity  has  aspired 
so  long  to  realise.  "Why  seek  ye  the  living  among 
the  dead?"  Over  the  grave  made  yesterday,  not  less 
than  over  the  tomb  of  Him  who  brought  life  and 
immortality  to  light,  and  whose  life  was  a  victory 


240  THE  SWORD  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

over  death  so  that  it  revealed  to  what  fine  issues  the 
soul  ascends,  it  may  be  said,  "He  is  not  here;  He  is 
risen." 

What  is  excellent, 
As  God  lives,  is  permanent; 
Hearts  are  dust,  hearts'  loves  remain 
Heart's  love  will  meet  them  again. 


THE  ETERNAL  VALUES  S41 


Holy  Father,  into  Thy  hands  we  commend  the  spirits  of 
our  brothers  who  gave  their  lives  for  their  homes  and  as  a 
ransom  for  the  liberties  of  mankind.  Accept  them  in  the 
name  of  Him  who  poured  out  His  life  on  the  Cross  for  all 
humanity.  Eternal  rest  give  unto  them,  O  Lord,  and  let 
Thy  light  shine  upon  them  for  ever  more.  Subdue  us  with 
a  sense  of  the  awe  and  tenderness  of  the  Unseen  into  which 
they  have  entered,  and  may  the  nobility  of  their  sacrifice 
exalt  and  purify  us  for  Thy  service.  In  the  name  of  Jesus, 
Amen. 


• 

Date  Due 

My  12 '38 

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